Distinct Substrates of Idiopathic Ventricular Fibrillation Revealed by Arrhythmia Characteristics on Implantable Cardioverter-Defibrillator

Background

Idiopathic ventricular fibrillation (IVF) can be associated with undetected distinct conditions such as microstructural cardiomyopathic alterations (MiCM) or Purkinje (Purk) activities with structurally normal hearts.

Objectives

This study sought to evaluate the characteristics of recurrent VF recorded on implantable defibrillator electrograms, associated with these substrates.

Methods

This was a multicenter collaboration study. At 32 centers, we selected patients with an initial diagnosis of IVF and recurrent arrhythmia at follow-up without antiarrhythmic drugs, in whom mapping demonstrated Purk or MiCM substrate. We analyzed variables related to previous ectopy, sinus rate preceding VF, trigger, and initial VF cycle lengths. Logistic regression with cross validation was used to evaluate the performance of criteria to discriminate Purk or MiCM substrates.

Results

Among 95 patients (35 women, age 35 ± 11 years) meeting the inclusion criteria, IVF was associated with MiCM in 41 and Purk in 54 patients. A total of 117 arrhythmia recurrences including 91% VF were recorded on defibrillator. Three variables were mostly discriminant. Sinus tachycardia (≤570 ms) was more frequent in MiCM (35.9% vs 13.4%, P = 0.014) whereas short-coupled (<350 ms) triggers were most frequent in Purk-related VF (95.5% vs 23.1%, P = 0.001), which also had shorter VFCLs (182 ± 15 ms vs 215 ± 24 ms, P < 0.001).The multivariable combination provided the highest prediction (accuracy = 0.93 ± 0.05, range 0.833-1.000), discriminating 81% of IVF substrates with a high probability (>80%). Ectopy were inconsistently present before VF.

Conclusions

Characteristics of arrhythmia recurrences on implantable cardioverter- defibrillator provide phenotypic markers of the distinct and hidden substrates underlying IVF. These findings have significant clinical and genetic implications.