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CLINICAL STUDIES

Cardiac death and stored electrograms in patients with third-generation implantable cardioverter-defibrillators

^a Division of Cardiology, Department of Medicine, Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
^* Ventritex, Inc., Sunnyvale, California, USA

Manuscript received November 11, 1997; revised manuscript received May 15, 1998, accepted June 2, 1998.

Address for correspondence: Dr. Dusan Z. Kocovic, Cardiovascular Division, 9 Founders, Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, 3400 Spruce Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104

Objectives. We sought to utilize terminal stored intracardiac electrograms (EGMs) to study the electrophysiologic events that accompany mortality in patients with third-generation implantable cardioverter-defibrillators (ICDs).

Background. Despite their ability to effectively terminate ventricular tachyarrhythmias, cardiac mortality in patients with ICDs remains high. The mechanisms and modes of death in these patients are not well understood.

Methods. We retrospectively analyzed clinical data and stored EGMs from patients enrolled in the clinical trial of the Ventritex Cadence ICD. Of the 1,729 patients 119 died during 6 years of follow-up. The final recorded EGM was reviewed. Postimplant EGMs as well as 50 control EGMs were used to define normal EGM characteristics.

Results. There were 36 noncardiac deaths (30%) and 83 cardiac deaths (70%). Of the cardiac deaths, 55 (66%) were nonsudden and 28 (34%) were sudden. When cardiac deaths were analyzed, 46 (55%) had no stored EGMs within 1 h of death, implying that the deaths were not directly related to tachyarrhythmias. In 37 cardiac deaths (18 nonsudden, 19 sudden), stored EGMs were present within 1 h of death. In these 37 deaths, the final EGM recorded was wide (>158 ms) in 33 (89%). Wide EGMs were interpreted as ventricular tachycardia in 27 and ventricular fibrillation in 6. In 13 of the 33 patients (39%) with wide EGMs, therapy was not delivered by the ICD, as it incorrectly detected a spontaneous termination of the arrhythmia. EGMs were significantly wider if recorded within 1 h, as compared with those recorded from 1 to 48 h before death (261 ± 124 vs. 181 ± 93 ms, p = 0.04).

Conclusions. Only 37 patients (31%) who died after placement of an ICD had a stored EGM within 1 h of the time of death, suggesting that the majority of deaths (69%) were not the immediate result of a tachyarrhythmia. When EGMs were recorded, they were wide in 89% of patients. These wide EGMs most likely represent intracardiac recordings of electromechanical dissociation. Thus, of the 119 deaths, 112 (94%) were not the immediate result of a tachyarrhythmia.

Abbreviations and Acronyms   CAST = Cardiac Arrhythmia Suppression Trial   EGM = intracardiac electrogram   EMD = electromechanical dissociation   ICD = implantable cardioverter-defibrillator   NSCD = nonsudden cardiac death   SCD = sudden cardiac death   VF = ventricular fibrillation   VT = ventricular tachycardia

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