520 research outputs found
Role of Risk Stratification and Genetics in Sudden Cardiac Death
No full textSudden cardiac death (SCD) is a major public health issue due to its increasing incidence in the general population and the difficulty in identifying high-risk individuals. Nearly 300,000-350,000 patients in the United States and 4- to 5 million patients in the world die from SCD. Coronary artery disease and advanced heart failure are the main etiology for SCD. Ischemia of any cause precipitates lethal arrhythmias, and ventricular tachycardia and ventricular fibrillation are the most common lethal arrhythmias precipitating SCD. Pulse-less electrical activity, brady-arrhythmia and electromechanical dissociation also result in SCD. Most sudden cardiac deaths occur out-of-the-hospital setting, so it is difficult to estimate the public burden, which results in overestimating the incidence of SCD. The insufficiency and limited predictive value of various indicators and criteria for SCD result in the increasing incidences. As a result, there is a need to develop better risk stratification criteria and find modifiable variables to decrease the incidence. Primary and secondary prevention and treatment of SCD need further research. This critical review is focused on the etiology, risk factors, prognostic factors and importance of risk stratification of SCD.The accepted manuscript in pdf format is listed with the files at the bottom of this page. The presentation of the authors' names and (or) special characters in the title of the manuscript may differ slightly between what is listed on this page and what is listed in the pdf file of the accepted manuscript; that in the pdf file of the accepted manuscript is what was submitted by the author
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