Metabolic Syndrome Increases Risk for AF After Ablation

People with metabolic syndrome have an increased risk of recurrent atrial fibrillation (AF) after catheter ablation, a new study found. 

Researchers studied 1496 patients who had received catheter ablation for AF, 485 of which had metabolic syndrome.  After 21 months, 39% of those with metabolic syndrome had experienced recurring AF, compared with 32% of those without metabolic syndrome.  This higher failure rate applied only to patients with nonparoxysmal AF, and not paroxysmal AF. 

Among these patients, elevated inflammatory markers were also predictors of AF. 

"It is reasonable to state with prudence that the mechanism linking metabolic syndrome to a higher recurrence rate in nonparoxysmal AF is mediated via inflammation,“ researchers wrote.

“Because in most patients, metabolic syndrome is an ongoing state, substrate changes possibly continue to occur, and a 1-time ablation-based 'substrate modification' may be insufficient. It is also possible that we simply do not yet know how to modify arrhythmogenic substrate," they concluded.

-Michael Potts