ICD Can Aid Nonischemic Cardiomyopathy Patients

A clinical study has found that implantable cardioverter defibrillators (ICDs) can improve the survival of nonischemic cardiomyopathy patients, whose weakened heart muscle is caused by factors unrelated to coronary artery disease. The results were presented at the annual meeting of the American Heart Association in Orlando (FL, USA).

The study, called DEFINITE, involved 458 participants and showed that ICD recipients had a statistically significant reduction in rate of arrhythmic death and showed a strong trend toward reduction of overall mortality rates. During the study, overall mortality at two years was 13.8% in the standard (control) group versus 8.1% in the ICD group. In all, 56 deaths occurred, 33 from the control group and 23 from the ICD group. Of total deaths, 14 resulted from cardiac arrest, 11 in the control group and three in the ICD group, a relative risk of .26 for the ICD subjects.

"The DEFINITE study showed that ICDs can reduce the risk of sudden cardiac death in nonischemic cardiomyopathy patients and tend to reduce all-cause mortality,” said principal investigator Alan Kadish, M.D., professor of medicine from the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University (Chicago, IL, USA).

The ICDs used in the study were provided by St. Jude Medical (St. Paul, MN, USA) and included the single-chambered Atlas and Photon models.





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