BACKGROUND: The tissue selectivity of pulsed field ablation (PFA) provides safety advantages over radiofrequency ablation in treating atrial fibrillation. One-shot PFA catheters have been shown capable of performing pulmonary vein isolation, but not flexible lesion sets such as linear lesions. A novel lattice-tip ablation catheter with a compressible 9-mm nitinol tip is able to deliver either focal radiofrequency ablation or PFA lesions, each in 2 to 5 s. METHODS: In a 3-center, single-arm, first-in-human trial, the 7.5F lattice catheter was used with a custom mapping system to treat paroxysmal or persistent atrial fibrillation. Toggling between energy sources, point-by-point pulmonary vein encirclement was performed using biphasic PFA posteriorly and either temperature-controlled irrigated radiofrequency ablation or PFA anteriorly (RF/PF or PF/PF, respectively). Linear lesions were created using either PFA or radiofrequency ablation. RESULTS: The 76-patient cohort included 55 paroxysmal and 21 persistent atrial fibrillation patients undergoing either RF/PF (40 patients) or PF/PF (36 patients) ablation. The pulmonary vein isolation therapy duration time (transpiring from first to last lesion) was 22.6±8.3 min/patient, with a mean of 50.1 RF/PF lesions/patient. Linear lesions included 14 mitral (4 RF/2 RF+PF/8 PF), 34 left atrium roof (12 RF/22 PF), and 44 cavotricuspid isthmus (36 RF/8 PF) lines, with therapy duration times of 5.1±3.5, 1.8±2.3, and 2.4±2.1 min/patient, respectively. All lesion sets were acutely successful, using 4.7±3.5 minutes of fluoroscopy. There were no device-related complications, including no strokes. Postprocedure esophagogastroduodenoscopy revealed minor mucosal thermal injury in 2 of 36 RF/PF and 0 of 24 PF/PF patients. Postprocedure brain magnetic resonance imaging revealed diffusion-weighted imaging+/fluid-attenuated inversion recovery- and diffusion-weighted imaging+/fluid-attenuated inversion recovery+ asymptomatic lesions in 5 and 3 of 51 patients, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: A novel lattice-tip catheter could safely and rapidly ablate atrial fibrillation using either a combined RF/PF approach (capitalizing on the safety of PFA and the years of experience with radiofrequency energy) or an entirely PF approach. Registration: URL: https://www.clinicaltrials.gov; Unique identifiers: NCT04141007 and NCT04194307.

Cardiac Electrophysiology Section Department of Cardiovascular Medicine Cleveland Clinic OH

Centre for Cardiology and Angiology Department of Cardiovascular Diseases Vilnius University Lithuania

Department of Cardiology Homolka Hospital Prague Czech Republic

Department of Cardiology Institute for Clinical and Experimental Medicine Prague Czech Republic

Helmsley Electrophysiology Center Department of Cardiology Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai New York NY

Texas Cardiac Arrhythmia Institute at St David's Medical Center Austin

University of Bordeaux CHU Bordeaux IHU LIRYC ANR 10 IAHU 04 France

References provided by Crossref.org

Dual-energy lattice-tip ablation system for persistent atrial fibrillation: a randomized trial

Predictors of Success for Pulmonary Vein Isolation With Pulsed-field Ablation Using a Variable-loop Catheter With 3D Mapping Integration: Complete 12-month Outcomes From inspIRE

Reversible Pulsed Electrical Fields as an In Vivo Tool to Study Cardiac Electrophysiology: The Advent of Pulsed Field Mapping

Preclinical assessment of the feasibility, safety and lesion durability of a novel 'single-shot' pulsed field ablation catheter for pulmonary vein isolation

Paroxysmal Atrial Fibrillation Ablation Using a Novel Variable-Loop Biphasic Pulsed Field Ablation Catheter Integrated With a 3-Dimensional Mapping System: 1-Year Outcomes of the Multicenter inspIRE Study

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ClinicalTrials.gov
NCT04141007, NCT04194307