particularly difficult cases in whom standard treatment had failed. In three of them mexiletine alone controlled the arrhythmia, but only at the cost of intolerable adverse effects. Combined treatment with mexiletine and propranolol, which have different actions and different adverse effects, enables arrhythmia to be suppressed through co-operative antiarrhythmic action. Since adverse effects h...

Synchronized direct current shock (Lown, Amarasingham, and Neuman, 1962) has rapidly become established as an effective and safe method of treating cardiac arrhythmias, but controversy remains about the use of antiarrhythmic drugs in maintaining sinus rhythm following the procedure. Although quinidine is potentially dangerous (Thomson, 1956; Oram and Davies, 1964; Davies, Leak, and Oram, 1965),...

Exercise tests performed 3 and 9 weeks after acute myocardial infarction in 205 patients were found to give prognostic information on the survival during a follow-up period of 2 to 5 years. The appearance of tachycardia, major ventricular arrhythmias, or anginal complaints during these early exercise tests was thus accompanied by a significantly increased mortality during the observation period...

Flecainide acetate is a potent class IC antiarrhythmic agent used mainly for the treatment of supraventricular arrhythmias. Acute overdose of this drug is rare but frequently fatal. The clinical course of a patient that ingested a large quantity of flecainide as a suicide attempt is described and current therapeutic strategies discussed. (JAccid Emerg Med 1998;15:423-425)

The objective of this randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial was to test the efficacy and safety of a new sustained-release preparation of the antiarrhythmic drug propafenone (propafenone SR) in reducing the frequency of symptomatic arrhythmia recurrences in patients with atrial fibrillation (AF). Patients with a history of symptomatic AF who were in sinus rhythm were rando...

Results: 1646 cases of ventricular arrhythmia or cardiac arrest and 379 cases of QTc prolongation or torsade de pointes were associated with methadone. Monthly reports of QTc prolongation or torsade de pointes increased from a mean of 0.3 (95% CI, 0.1 to 0.5) before the 2002 publication to a mean of 3.5 (CI, 2.5 to 4.8) after it. After 2000, methadone was the second-most common primary suspect ...

Among implantable cardioverter-defibrillator (ICD) recipients, there are patients with recurrent episodes of electrical storm (ES), retractable to the optimal antiarrhythmic drug therapy or invasive ablation procedures. A relatively novel anti-ischemic drug with also antiarrhythmic properties, ranolazine, may effectively suppress ventricular arrhythmias in such patients for a long period of time.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES Amiodarone is quite an effective anti-arrhythmic drug indicated for controlling ventricular and supra-ventricular arrhythmias, and it is being widely administered in clinical practice. However, its chronic use may be associated to severe side effects which may be worsened by anesthetic-surgical acts, thus increasing the risk of such procedures. This study aimed at revi...

Clinical studies have suggested that quinidine is less effective when used for the treatment of atrial arrhythmias in pediatric patients compared with its clinical effectiveness in the adult patient population. Age-related changes in the cardiac actions of quinidine on action potential duration and interaction with potassium channels in several mammalian species also have been reported. We inve...

Fourteen patients with established atrial fibrillation (longer than three months) that was refractory to treatment were studied to compare the clinical and electrophysiological effects of amiodarone and bepridil. All patients initially received bepridil for three weeks (200-600 mg/day), followed by amiodarone for two to three months (100-400 mg/day). Bepridil seemed to be slightly more effectiv...