Acute digitoxin intoxication treated by intracardiac pacemaker: experience in sixty-eight patients

Out of 124 patients who had taken massive doses of digitoxin in attempted suicide, emergency endocardial pacing was performed in the 68 with the worst prognosis. The mortality (13%) in the 124 patients compared favorably with the mortality (20%) in a previous series of 70 similar patients none of whom were paced. Sixteen (23%) of the 68 paced patients died. The causes of death were: asystole (two); cardiogenic shock (two); septicemia (one); and ventricular fibrillation (eleven). Ventricular fibrillation occurred during introduction of the pacing catheter in two patients, as a result of electrode displacement in these patients, because of premature withdrawal of the catheter in one patient, and for no detectable reason, during normally proceeding pacing, in five patients. Endocardial pacing has a place in the emergency treatment of massive digitoxin poisoning. Its chief hazards are mechanical, and one of the commonest is electrode displacement.