Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials of Atrial Fibrillation Ablation With Pulmonary Vein Isolation Versus Without
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Objectives This meta-analysis examined the ability of pulmonary vein isolation (PVI) to prevent atrial fibrillation in randomized controlled trials (RCTs) in which the patients not receiving PVI nevertheless underwent a procedure. Background PVI is a commonly used procedure for the treatment of atrial fibrillation (AF), and its efficacy has usually been judged against therapy with anti-arrhythmic drugs in open-label trials. There have been several RCTs of AF ablation in which both arms received an ablation, but the difference between the treatment arms was inclusion or omission of PVI. These trials of an ablation strategy with PVI versus an ablation strategy without PVI may provide a more rigorous method for evaluating the efficacy of PVI. Methods Medline and Cochrane databases were searched for RCTs comparing ablation including PVI with ablation excluding PVI. The primary efficacy endpoint was freedom from atrial fibrillation (AF) and atrial tachycardia at 12 months. A random-effects meta-analysis was performed using the restricted maximum likelihood estimator. Results Overall, 6 studies (n = 610) met inclusion criteria. AF recurrence was significantly lower with an ablation including PVI than an ablation without PVI (RR: 0.54; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.33 to 0.89; p = 0.0147; I 2 = 79.7%). Neither the type of AF (p = 0.48) nor the type of non-PVI ablation (p = 0.21) was a significant moderator of the effect size. In 3 trials the non-PVI ablation procedure was performed in both arms, whereas PVI was performed in only 1 arm. In these studies, AF recurrence was significantly lower when PVI was included (RR: 0.32; 95% CI: 0.14 to 0.73; p = 0.007, I 2 78%). Conclusions In RCTs where both arms received an ablation, and therefore an expectation amongst patients and doctors of benefit, being randomized to PVI had a striking effect, reducing AF recurrence by a half.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.020 | 0.053 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.004 | 0.002 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.022 | 0.052 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.007 | 0.006 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.004 | 0.002 |
| Open science | 0.002 | 0.002 |
| Research integrity | 0.003 | 0.003 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.005 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".