Slevin, M., Carroll, M., Murgatroyd, C. & McDowell, G.(2014) ‘Biophysical and molecular targets.’ In: Kibos, A.S., Knight, B.P., Essebag, V., Fishberger, S.B., Slevin, M. & Tintoiu I. (eds.) (2014) Cardiac Arrhythmias: From Basic Mechanisms to State-of-the-art Management. London: Springer pp. 335-343 (9 pages)
Cardiac arrhythmias represent a large heterogeneous collection of heart abnormalities characterized by the presence of electrical dysfunction caused by abnormalities in the conduction of nerve signals. In these cases, the heart either beats irregularly, too fast or too slowly. Arrhythmia of the heart can have both acute and chronic long-term life threatening effects including cardiac arrest, stroke, embolism and increased propensity for development of atherosclerosis and unstable plaques susceptible to thrombosis. Whilst historical facts types of arrhythmia and epidemiology of this group of diseases has been covered in detail by other authors, it is worth reiterating the importance of identifying and treating this complex group of disorders that can account for a large proportion of both asymptomatic and symptomatic disease following acute myocardial infarction (46%)1, with high-degree atrioventricular block associated with a very high degree of cardiac death. Whilst currently available implantable cardioverter defibrillator therapy is now considered to be the most effective against malignant arrhythmias, these are in fact only effective at treating some kinds of arrhythmia and are extremely expensive making the search for more effective and specific pharmaceuticals imperative.
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