Treatment for patients suffering from atrial fibrillation – commonly referred to as Afib – will be shorter and safer, thanks in part to a new technology developed by University of Iowa Health Care researchers.
Afib is a type of arrhythmia, or abnormal heartbeat, caused by rapid and irregular beats from the upper chambers of the heart, which beat out of sync with the lower heart chambers.
Afib can now be treated with the Farapulse PFA System, which uses electrical signals that isolate and ablate specific heart cells in a precise pattern, resulting in a quicker and safer procedure.
Typically, patients have been treated using a cardiac ablation procedure which involves routing catheters through the veins to the heart and then applying extreme heat or cold to target misfiring heart cells. This standard treatment carries a small risk of damaging healthy nerve or muscle cells outside the heart.
In March 2021, Europe approved the new technology, which led to a study of 17,000 patients who received the treatment. The study showed that no one developed esophageal injury, pulmonary vein stenosis, or permanent injury to the phrenic
nerve, which controls the diaphragm.
“Pulse field ablation, particularly Farapulse, offers a safe, more efficient, and effective treatment option for patients with atrial fibrillation in the state of Iowa, while significantly cutting down the procedural times,” said Paari Dominic, MBBS, MPH, director of electrophysiology with UI Health Care. “It will significantly increase access to the procedure and reduce wait times.”
Physicians in the cardiac electrophysiology division of UIHC are the first in the state to begin using the Farapulse PFA System in clinical care, thanks in part to Steven Mickelsen, MD, an assistant professor in the Carver College of Medicine and founder of Farapulse, Inc.
Working first as a physician and then a faculty member in the UI’s Abboud
Cardiovascular Research Center (ACRC), Dr. Mickelsen drew on 15-plus years of experience inside cardiac catheterization labs to formulate and build the prototypes that eventually became the Farapulse PFA system.
“There are relatively few basic scientists who identify the causes of the diseases that lead to heart arrhythmias—the University of Iowa and the ACRC has traditionally been one of the institutions that has supported these scientists and physician-scientists,” said Barry London, MD, PhD, director of the ACRC and the Division of Cardiovascular Medicine. “There are even fewer electrophysiologists who can see the limitations of our current technologies and successfully invent new, clinically relevant ways to circumvent them. Steven is a unique example, and we could not be prouder of the national and international impact that his inventions will have.”
