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Posts Tagged ‘vt’

Man made confusions in labelling ventricular tachycardia !

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , on February 24, 2011| Leave a Comment »

How to name  a ventricular tachycardia ?

This  continues to be a  favorite past & present  time of  modern-day cardiologists. Especially ,  VTs associated with structurally normal heart  suffers with this  protracted problem .Widespread use of  EP study has not solved the issue as yet.

The   VTs that arise from the left ventricle in an apparently normal heart   has been referred  by  various terms.

  • VT with structurally  normal heart
  • Idiopathic left ventricular tachycardia
  • Verapamil sensitive  VT
  • Septal VT (It can be either myocardial /non myocardial origin)
  • Narrow qrs VT
  • Fasicular VT
  • LVOT tachycardia
  • Hemodynamically stable VT
  • Belhassen VT

Now we have still more exotic VTs like Cuspal , mitral annular , etc . All of the above can mean anything , or same thing   in different centers  ,  different cardiologists in different times .

* RVOT tachycardias also have  many synonyms.( Adenosine sensitive, Adrenergic,  Gallavardin, Parkinson Pop, etc )

VTs associated with CAD , valvular , myocardial diseases generally devoid of  nomenclature problems. Ischemic VT  is yet to be classified in a proper fashion.

The confusion in classifying VT is  not due to the complexity of heart disease. It is due to  the general  comprehension failure as  every VT can be described with reference to clinical , ECG morphology, hemodynamics and presence or absence of underlying heart disease. A simplified and clinically useful VT classification is being prepared in this forum .Will be published shortly .

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If ischemia is a powerful trigger for ventricular arrhythmias ,Why cardiac arrhytmias are less common in NSTEMI ?

Posted in Cardiology - Clinical, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 10, 2009| Leave a Comment »

Acute coronary syndrome is the commonest cardiac emergency. STEMI and NSTEMI are the two clinical limbs of ACS. Generally they have distinct clinical, ECG, angiographic features.(Ofcourse, with some degree of overlap) . It is  a  mystery , both clinical presentations differ so much inspite of the common denominator  , namely ,  an injured plaque with add on thrombus  within the coronary artery. The primary difference between these two entities is, in  STEMI the occlusion occurs sudden and complete and in NSTEMI it occurs slow and incomplete

Cardiac arrhythmias in ACS

It is a  much published factoid  for  many decades, that  only one third of STEMI patients  reach the hospital alive ! The reason being , STEMI  is very much prone for primary VF.  Contrary  to this ,  most pateints with NSTEMI reach the hospital alive ! How ?

Both are ACS, if ischemia is a powerful trigger for dangerous ventricular  arrhythmia’s , NSTEMI should also behave  similarly .So what protects against arrhythmias in NSTEMI ?

  • We realise ,  by observational experience (Not EBM !)  It is the suddenness and totality of ischemia that trigger dangerous form of arrhythmia  .
  • Further, a balanced  ischemia in two contralateral segments (or global  ischemia) some how protects against development of ventricular  fibrillation .This may be due to preservation  of  electrical homogeneity  , and the spherical VT spiral waves are not sustainable.
  • In contrast , STEMI has a sudden  focal , ischemic  zone that initiates the VT and    ischemia free  contralateral segment  welcoming  and sustaining the  reentrant wavelet.
  • The observation of primarily single vessel disese in STEMI and multivessel disease in NSTEMI also give credence to this concept.
  • Further , ischemic preconditioning can exert an important anti arrhythmic  effect in NSTEMI as  patients with unstable angina have   slow, repetitive episodes of ischemia prior to the index event .
  • Post MI scar mediated VT/VF is independent of degree of overall ischemia
  • It is also established ,  a sub group of  STEMI pateints  who  had  preinfarction angina(  ie . a brief  period of UA/NSTEMI) have very low risk of SCD  supporting the concept of sensitising the myocardium against ventricular arrhythmias.

Final message

Even though , there is a convincing concept  of  Ischemia induced  cardiac arrhythmia in literature ,in real patients it is very difficult to link the two in many situations..UA/NSTEMI is the most common  acute ischemic event but the incidence of VT/VF here,  is far less than one would expect.In ACS , focal , total  ischemia is more likely to precipitate a VT/VF than multifocal and global ischemia.

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