title: Is this atrial fibrillation?
abstract: A 19-year-old girl was referred to our cardiology department for catheter ablation (isolation of the pulmonary veins) of paroxysmal atrial fibrillation (AF). The diagnosis was made upon a 12-lead ECG of the arrhythmia documented in the emergency room. The ECG showed an irregular tachycardia without wide QRS complexes. Careful assessment revealed the irregularity of the rhythm was a sweep artifact due to a mechanic failure of the ECG-machine to advance the article smoothly. During EP study a concealed anteroseptal accessory pathway causing an orthodromic AV reentrant tachycardia was eliminated by radio-frequency ablation. This example emphasizes the need for careful assessment of an ECG tracing, including printed legends and technical data.
authors.affiliation: University Hospital of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland. Amir.S.Jadidi@hcuge.ch
authors.forename: Amir S
authors.initials: AS
authors.lastname: Jadidi
authors.forename: Henri
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Sunthorn
authors.forename: Haran
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Burri
authors.forename: Pascale
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Gentil-Baron
authors.forename: Dipen
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Shah
mesh_terms: D016477:Artifacts; D001281:Atrial Fibrillation / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000601:surgery; D017115:Catheter Ablation; D003937:Diagnosis, Differential; D004562:Electrocardiography; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D013611:Tachycardia, Atrioventricular Nodal Reentry / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000601:surgery; D055815:Young Adult