Short-Term Memory and Restitution During Ventricular Fibrillation in Human Hearts

Background— Action potential duration (APD) variation is an important determinant of wave break and reentry. The determinants of APD variability during early ventricular fibrillation (VF) in myopathic human hearts have not been studied. The objective of this study was to study the role of APD restitution and short-term cardiac memory on variation in human VF. Methods and Results— The study consisted of 7 patients (67�9 years old) with ejection fraction <35%. Monophasic action potentials were recorded from the right and/or left ventricular septum during VF. APD60/90 was measured in sinus beat preceding induction of VF, and its amplitude was used to define 60%/90% repolarization in VF. The monophasic action potential upstroke (dV/dtmax) was used to characterize local excitability. Simple linear regression showed that variability in APDn60 was determined by APD/diastolic interval restitution (R2=0.48, P<0.0001) and short-term memory (APD60 n−1, n−2, n−3, n−4; R2=0.55, 0.40, 0.33, and 0.27 respectively; P<0.0...