Number of Premature Ventricular Complexes Predicts Long-Term Outcomes in Patients with Persistent Atrial Fibrillation

Premature ventricular complexes (PVCs) are common electrocardiographic abnormalities and may be a prognosticator in predicting mortality in patients with structurally normal hearts or chronic heart diseases. Whether PVC burden was associated with mortality in patients with chronic atrial fibrillation (AF) remained unknown. We investigated the prognostic value of PVC burden in patients with persistent AF.

A retrospective analysis of 24 h Holter recordings of 1767 patients with persistent AF was conducted. Clinical characteristics, 24 h average heart rate (HR), and PVC measures, including 24 h PVC burden and the presence of consecutive PVCs (including any PVC couplet, triplet, or non-sustained ventricular tachycardia) were examined for the prediction of all-cause and cardiovascular mortality using the Cox proportional hazards model.

After a median follow-up time of 30 months, 286 (16%) patients died and 1481 (84%) patients survived. Multivariate analysis revealed that age, heart failure, stroke, angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitor/angiotensin receptor blocker, beta-blocker, digoxin, oral anticoagulant use, and estimated glomerular filtration rate were significant baseline predictors of all-cause mortality and cardiovascular mortality. Twenty-four-hour PVC burden and the presence of consecutive PVCs were significantly associated with all-cause and cardiovascular mortality after adjusting for significant clinical factors. When compared to the first quartile of PVC burden (<0.003%/day), the highest quartile (>0.3%/day) was significantly associated with an increased risk of all-cause mortality (hazard ratio, 2.46; 95% CI, 1.77-3.42) and cardiovascular mortality (hazard ratio: 2.67; 95% CI, 1.76-4.06).

Twenty-four-hour PVC burden is independently associated with all-cause and cardiovascular mortality in patients with persistent AF.