Poor Heart Rate Reserve Predicts New Onset Atrial Fibrillation in Middle Aged Adults - The 63rd Annual Conference of the Israel Heart Society in association with the Israel Society of Cardiothoracic Surgery 12-13 April 2016, David Intercontinental Hotel, Tel-Aviv, Israel

Avi Sabbag ¹ Yehezkel Sidi ² Shaye Kivity ² Roy Binart ¹ Shlomo Segev ³ Michael Glikson ¹ Ilan Goldenberg ¹ Elad Maor ¹

¹Leviev Heart Institute, The Chaim Sheba Medical Center, Tel-Hashomer, ramat gan, Please Select
²Department of Internal Medicine C, The Chaim Sheba Medical Center, Tel-Hashomer, Israel, ramat gan, Please Select
³Institute for Medical Screening, The Chaim Sheba Medical Center, Tel-Hashomer, ramat gan, Please Select

Background: Autonomic dysfunction is associated with the atrial arrhythmogenesis. The purpose of this study was to investigate the association between heart rate reserve (HRR), and new onset atrial fibrillation (AF) among middle-aged adults.

Methods: We investigated 15,729 apparently healthy self-referred men and women who underwent periodic health screening examinations between the years 2000-2015. All subjects were free of AF and had completed maximal exercise stress test according to the Bruce protocol at their first visit.

Results: Mean age of study population was 47.8 ± 10 years and 73% were men. Median HRR was 73 ± 3 bpm. A total of 288 (1.81%) incident events occurred during 6.5 ± 4 years. Kaplan Meier survival analysis showed that the cumulative probability of AF at 6 years was higher among subjects low HRR ( Conclusions: Poor HRR is independently associated with the development of new onset AF. Further studies are warranted to elucidate the relationship between changes in normal autonomic tone and the pathogenesis of AF.