© 2004 by BMJ Publishing Group & British Cardiac Society
EDITORIAL
Importance of using biphasic shock waveforms for cardioversion from atrial fibrillation: an unresolved issue
Correspondence to:
Correspondence to:
Dr John M Morgan
Southampton University Hospitals, Southampton, SO16 6UY, UK; jmm@cardiology.co.uk
Is a biphasic defibrillation waveform "better" than a monophasic waveform for cardioversion from atrial fibrillation?
Keywords: biphasic shock waveforms; cardioversion; atrial fibrillation
| The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below. |
In a previous issue of Heart, Scholten and colleagues presented data to show that a biphasic external atrial defibrillation shock waveform offers no significant advantage over a monophasic shock waveform in current clinical practice.1 However, there is evidence in this study and elsewhere to suggest that a biphasic defibrillation waveform is "better" than monophasic.2–5 The sense that this should be so may be engendered by the past experience of electrophysiologists with ventricular defibrillators and the decrease in defibrillation threshold that was seen with the advent of biphasic shock waveforms in these devices.6 The question is whether the perceived advantages of biphasic waveforms for atrial defibrillation can be translated into clinical benefit for patients?
Scholten and colleagues have shown that biphasic and monophasic shocks are of similar efficacy in achieving sinus rhythm but at a lower energy level with biphasic waveform.1 In this sense the study’s outcome is similar to
CiteULike 
Complore 
Connotea 
Del.icio.us 
Digg 
Reddit 
Technorati What's this?
- Full Text
- Full Text (PDF)
- Submit a response
- Alert me when this article is cited
- Alert me when eLetters are posted
- Alert me if a correction is posted
- Citation Map
Services
- Email this link to a friend
- Similar articles in this journal
- Similar articles in PubMed
- Add article to my folders
- Download to citation manager
- Request Permissions
Citing Articles
Google Scholar
PubMed
Topic Collections
Bookmark with
Register for free content
The full back archive is now available for all BMJ Journals. Institutional subscribers may access the entire archive as part of their subscription. Personal subscribers will also have access to all content when logged in. Non-subscribers who register have free access to all articles published before 2006 right back to volume 1 issue 1. Register here to access the free archive of all BMJ Journals.
Don't forget to sign up for content alerts so you keep up to date with all the articles as they are published.
