Pamela Mason, MD, from the University of Virginia Health System, discusses her recent session at Heart Rhythm 2023.

Transcripts:

Hi, I'm Pam Mason. I am the electrophysiology lab director at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, Virginia. I was fortunate to be part of a cardio-obstetrics panel that has provided much research in our community in general, and I've been really gratified that the Heart Rhythm Society (HRS) has taken an interest in this. HRS, in conjunction with some other societies, just published the most recent guidelines statement on arrhythmia management for pregnant patients. Specifically, for my session, I presented on atrial fibrillation (AF) during pregnancy. This is a very interesting area. Fortunately, AF is rare during pregnancy, but there are a lot of pregnant women, so the incidence is still fairly high. We don't have a lot of prospective data. It's not been an area that has been well researched. I think we're making some inroads in improving that. While AF is rare during pregnancy, it is going to be more common in patients who have pre-existing structural heart disease. For patients who have had a pre-existing history of AF, the incidence is very high. AF is associated with both worsened maternal and fetal outcomes. How much of that is association vs causation is a little bit unclear, but I think we have an enough data to say it probably independently does worsen those outcomes. Women who have AF around the time of labor and delivery are more likely to have C-sections than other patients, and the babies are more likely to require a stay in the neonatal intensive care unit. So, if nothing else, this highlights the need for more research in this area.