Young lady suffers from life-threatening Ventricular Fibrillation - KIMS Doctors Treat Successfully

Hyderabad, 05th April 2023: A 36-year-old woman from Maharastra who had recurrent episodes of loss of consciousness suggestive of cardiac arrest was implanted with an Implantable cardioverter-defibrillator (ICD), to save her life. She was doing well after that. She was presented to KIMS hospital in early March 2023, with repeated shocks for Ventricular fibrillation (Rapid heart rhythm leading to cardiac arrest). She experienced 30 shocks in a single day. No doubt, each shock protected her from death. But, so many shocks caused her agonizing distress, putting her heart at risk of weakening, and finally, may stop working. Further ICD battery was rapidly getting exhausted. She was given 4 different types of intravenous medications and put on a ventilator. Despite these measures, shocks continued though with less frequency. Then, Dr. B.Hygriv Rao, Senior Cardiologist and Director, Division of Pacing & Electrophysiology KIMS hospital, and his team designed a special strategy to save this patient.

Initially, Neural Ganglia, which supplied nerves to the heart was destroyed by radiofrequency ablation- a novel technique performed by Dr. Nagalaxmi, an anesthetist with special training in pain management. This helped to a certain extent as the runs of Ventricular fibrillation were very less and short. However, the extra beats which were triggering these persisted. Dr. Nagalaxmi said that they had experience using this technique successfully in five patients previously, who had serious heart rhythms. But this patient was very young and had a normally functioning heart.

At this point, the patient was subjected to 3-D mapping and ablation. Dr. Hygriv Rao and his team carefully located the extra beats in the left ventricle of the heart with precision and destroyed them with pulses of radiofrequency ablation. After a 2-hour long procedure, there were no runs of Fibrillation and also no extra beats.

The patient was extubated, and the next day she was able to walk freely on her own. She was discharged the next day and came for a follow-up in 2 weeks doing very well with no further symptoms. Dr.Hygriv Rao said, "these cases are very rare, and the most challenging situations faced by cardiologists the world over, and, fortunately, we have the technology to deal with them effectively. We have designed life-saving algorithms to treat dangerous arrhythmias which are cost-effective and precise. These clinical situations need very dedicated round the clock teamwork from different departments like Crtical care. anesthesia, cardiac surgery