Correlation of pulmonary vein reconnection patterns after cryoballoon and duty-cycled ablation of atrial fibrillation with the time of arrhythmia recurrence

Abstract

Background: Pulmonary vein isolation (PVI) is safe and effective in the treatment of atrial fibrillation (AF). We compare and correlate pulmonary vein (PV) reconnection patterns at repeat ablation in patients with recurrent AF after PVI using duty-cycled radiofrequency (RF) technology (PVAC) or second-generation cryoballoon (CB) with the time of AF recurrence. Methods and Results: In total, 85 PVAC and 66 CB patients undergoing a second ablation were enrolled 9.7 ± 3.4 months after initial PVI. PV reconnections were comparably high between both groups (93% PVAC and 92% CB patients). A mean of 2.79 ± 1.2 PVs/patient were reconnected after PVAC PVI compared with 1.97 ± 0.8 in CB patients, P