New research published in the European Heart Journal shows that it is extremely difficult to predict with accuracy among patients who have had a heart attack those who will go on to suffer a sudden cardiac death, even among those with a left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) of 35% or lower—commonly used as a justification for prophylactic defibrillator implantation in those patients. The authors of the study are an international consortium including Professor Niels Peek, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK and The Healthcare Improvement Studies Institute (THIS Institute), University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK; Professor Gerhard Hindricks and Dr. Nikolaos Dagres of Deutsches Herzzentrum der Charité, Berlin, Germany, and colleagues.
The findings of the study have provided the scientific foundation for the PROFID EHRA clinical trial, which is expected to change sudden cardiac death (SCD) prevention in clinical practice. Sudden cardiac death is the leading cause of death, accounting for around 20% of deaths in Europe. Patients with previous myocardial infarction (heart attack) are at particular risk due to life-threatening ventricular arrhythmias (irregular heartbeats).
The implantable cardioverter-defibrillator (ICD) detects and terminates these arrhythmias. However, defibrillator therapy is limited by the profound difficulty to identify patients at elevated sudden cardiac death risk as candidates for implantation. Risk stratification of sudden cardiac death after .