First-Line Pulsed-Field Ablation for Persistent AF Beats Medication: AVANT GUARD

First-Line Pulsed-Field Ablation for Persistent AF Beats Medication: AVANT GUARD

First-Line Pulsed-Field Ablation for Persistent AF Beats Medication: AVANT GUARD cmacahilig@crf.org Mon, 04/27/2026 - 12:19 Todd Neale There are both clinical and economic implications, as payers have been discouraging ablation in this population, one expert says.

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On behalf of the Canadian Heart Rhythm Society Device Advisory Committee, please find attached the Canadian Guidance for the 2025 Boston Scientific RELIANCE ePTFE ICD lead advisory.

Dilawri Foundation makes historic $60 million gift to revolutionize heart care, positioning Vancouver as global leader in heart care www.vchri.ca/news-release...

New cardiovascular institute positions Vancouver as global leader in heart care

Vancouver, BC – In a landmark announcement, the Dilawri Foundation has made a record-setting $60 million philanthropic gift to VGH & UBC Hospital Foundation to establish the Dilawri Cardiovascular Ins...

vchri.ca

NEW EPISODE OF THE LEAD! 🎙️ Host: Prashanthan Sanders, MBBS, PhD, FHRS 🎤 Guests: Jason G. Andrade, MD, FHRS and Melanie Gunawardene, MD Listen on your preferred podcast platform ➡️http://bit.ly/48bpxNn

If you’re free come learn how AI can enable clinical trials by providing expert adjudication of arrhythmia outcomes E.g. 1 year of follow-up in CIRCA-DOSE generated 32000 arrhythmia events needing 80k adjudications, which is labour intensive. AI is poised to be transformative

It’s amazing to see consistent information across populations Recapitulating data from CIRCA-DOSE the recent Advantage AF showed AF burden <0.1% & AF episodes less <1h on follow-up had HCU comparable to no AF Same threshold paroxysmal and Persistent AF shorturl.at/gBxXb

It’s been a while since I had to respond to an inflight medical emergency. The personnel, and equipment, on this @aircanada flight were exemplary. I’m grateful for the help they provided and how professional and attentive they were during a difficult situation.

And with that my time at #EHRA2025 and the Ablation innovation summit comes to a close. Congratulations to the organisers for curating another amazing meeting, and for facilitating such a wonderful knowledge exchange

Never been to a conference that invites you to eat the coffee cup… #EHRA2025

Continuing the conversation about AF burden - check out the Top Stories in Electrophysiology www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Top Stories: Ablation in atrial fibrillation

sciencedirect.com

We are incredibly grateful to the partners and donors who help support our heart rhythm program. While medically necessary hospital & physician services are universal, and funded provincially, we rely on donors to support capital investment @VGHFdn www.theglobeandmail.com/business/art...

Pitching in: Improving treatment for abnormal heart rhythm

Greg Wolfe purchased a $200,000 Medtronic PulseSelect machine for Vancouver General Hospital, which the hospital has used for more than 200 procedures

theglobeandmail.com

New #HeartSounds podcast for Feb 2025 talks #GLP1, #AEDs in schools, PAD pain, wildfires, & sexual minorities. Thanks Nancy Sweitzer, Jonathan Kim, @drjasonandrade.bsky.social, Kim Smolderen, @garimasharmamd.bsky.social, and Mark Miller for your insights! tctmd.com/audio/top-ca...

AEDs, Like Fire Extinguishers, Should Be in Every School, Say Experts

AEDs, Like Fire Extinguishers, Should Be in Every School, Say Experts

AEDs, Like Fire Extinguishers, Should Be in Every School, Say Experts hdellabella@crf.org Wed, 02/19/2025 - 13:11 Michael O'Riordan Demystifying the AED, and training a generation of kids in their use, is key to prevent “catastrophic” sudden…

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A brief thread on how the new post AF Ablation blanking period impacts clinical outcomes and AF burden from our recent publication in Circulation: A&E www.ahajournals.org/doi/full/10....

I’m happy to share that DRAI Martini is now available online in Nature Medicine Artificial intelligence #AI out-performed trained technologists for direct-to-physician reporting of AECG - less missed diagnoses, better sensitivity, better NPV. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Artificial intelligence for direct-to-physician reporting of ambulatory electrocardiography - Nature Medicine

In a large-scale analysis of ambulatory electrocardiographic recordings, a deep learning algorithm had a substantially higher sensitivity for the detection of critical arrhythmias as compared to techn...

nature.com

Atrial Fibrillation is a chronic and progressive disease, with progression being associated with worse clinical outcomes. www.heartrhythmjournal.com/article/S154...

Further to the previous post - @shirleybond has pushed the issue of public access defibrillators, with only BCcand Manitoba having supporting legislation, but a 3 site pilot coming online by 2026 is way to slow for such an important issue

More accessible defibrillators put people at the heart of health care

More people experiencing sudden cardiac arrest will receive life-saving support as the Province makes automated external defibrillators (AED) more widely available in several B.C. communities,…

buff.ly

This is an important initiative and definitely something @BCGovnews & @lisabeare should implement

B.C. considering AEDs in schools following student calls

After months of advocating for AEDs to be installed in all schools, student advocates from Point Grey Secondary are hearing from the province.

buff.ly

Crash risk following ICD implant. While legal restriction following implant introduces a « what if » it’s reassuring that crash rates among ICD recipients never exceeded those among controls in any tested interval in the first year after ICD implantation heart.bmj.com/content/110/...

Motor vehicle crash risk after cardioverter-defibrillator implantation: a population-based cohort study

Background Limited empirical evidence informs driving restrictions after implantable cardioverter-defibrillator (ICD) implantation. We sought to evaluate real-world motor vehicle crash risks after ICD...

heart.bmj.com

We had a great weekend in Washington at the TransformAf meeting followed by the Cardiovascular Clinical Trialists Forum. The former presenting the landscape of pulsed field ablation, from lesion science to clinical efficacy. The latter bringing together clinical trialists across 🫀, 🧠, 💉, etc

Celebrating John A. Cairns on his appointment to the Order of Canada. In addition to major international contributions to cardiology, notably demonstrating the benefits of aspirin for patients with unstable angina, John has been a support and mentor to many within and outside our division.

There’s something special about terminating AVNRT with ablation. Personally I like to target the slow pathway in tachycardia (1), watching it slow (2) with early temperature drop then blocks in slow pathway (3).

These two trials are "steps forward," @drjasonandrade.bsky.social says. "They’re helpful in improving our knowledge of the treatment of persistent A-fib, which is definitely an area where we need to improve our knowledge." @tctmd.bsky.social @ahascience.bsky.social www.tctmd.com/news/two-tri...

Two Trials Provide Insights Into Catheter Ablation Options for Persistent AF

There remains a need to identify patients who will derive benefits from adjunctive techniques on top of pulmonary vein isolation.

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Would you call this atrial fibrillation? What’s the prognostic significance of this finding?

Trying to recreate our #EPeeps here! Adding some great educators who have made the leap: @narrowqrs.bsky.social @mgkatz036.bsky.social @jeffreyvinocur.bsky.social @drjasonandrade.bsky.social @basteinberg.bsky.social @tinabaykaner.bsky.social and more…

Congrats to Rajeev Pathak, @prashsanders.bsky.social and team on the ARREST-AF RCT. Incredibly informative data - adjective comprehensive risk factor optimisation significantly improved post ablation AF freedom. We now have RCT evidence supporting RFM as a foundation and pillar of AF management.

Fantastic presentation from Mina Chung on the results of the TRIM-AF study. RFM +/- Metformin had benefit in symptoms but no benefit on AF burden.

Congratulations to Lena Rivard on the @ahascience.bsky.social presentation of the BRAIN-AF study results. Major observation is that cognitive decline occurs in many « low risk » AF patients. Unfortunately, Rivaroxaban 15 mg daily did not impact this risk in this double-dummy RCT.

Congratulations to @omwazni and the OPTION study team on the @ahascience.bsky.social presentation and publication of the OPTION trial. Similar low rates of stroke post ablation (no difference with laao vs OAC) with no significant 23% lower rate of major bleeding. www.nejm.org/doi/full/10....

Left Atrial Appendage Closure after Ablation for Atrial Fibrillation | NEJM

Oral anticoagulation is recommended after ablation for atrial fibrillation among patients at high risk for stroke. Left atrial appendage closure is a mechanical alternative to anticoagulation, but ...

nejm.org

Congratulations to @johnlsapp on the presentation and publication of VANISH-2. First line VT ablation is associated with significant reduction in composite of death, VT, storm for patients with ischemic cardiomyopathy. www.nejm.org/doi/full/10....