Trends in Thoracic Impedance and Arrhythmia Burden Among Patients with Implanted Cardiac Defibrillators During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Abstract

Hospitalizations for acute cardiac conditions have markedly declined during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, yet the cause of this decline is not clear. Using remote monitoring data of 4,029 patients with implantable cardiac defibrillators (ICDs) living in New York City and Minneapolis/Saint Paul, we assessed changes in markers of cardiac status among these patients and compared thoracic impedance and arrhythmia burden in 2019 and 2020 from January through August. We found no change in several key disease decompensation markers among patients with implanted ICD devices during the first phase of COVID-19 pandemic, suggesting that the decrease in cardiovascular hospitalizations in this period is not reflective of a true population-level improvement in cardiovascular health.

• Authors: Yuan Lu, Karthik Murugiah, Paul W Jones, César Caraballo, Shiwani Mahajan, Daisy S Massey, Rezwan Ahmed, Eric M Bader, Harlan M Krumholz
• Journal: medRxiv : the preprint server for health sciences (medRxiv) (Mar 01 2021) United States
• PMID: 33688679 (Publication Type: Preprint)