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Review
. 2020 Aug 2;10(4):328-333.
doi: 10.1080/20009666.2020.1786901.

Complications of leadless vs conventional (lead) artificial pacemakers - a retrospective review

Yasar Sattar  1 , Waqas Ullah  2 , Sohaib Roomi  2 , Hiba Rauf  3 , Maryam Mukhtar  4 , Asrar Ahmad  2 , Zain Ali  2 , Muhammad Shan-Ul- Abedin  5 , M Chadi Alraies  6
Affiliations
Review

Complications of leadless vs conventional (lead) artificial pacemakers - a retrospective review

Yasar Sattar et al. J Community Hosp Intern Med Perspect. .

Abstract

Background: Leadless pacemakers (LPM) are introduced in cardiovascular market with a goal to avoid lead- and pocket-associated complications due to conventional artificial pacemakers (CPM). The comparison of LPM and CPM complications is not well studied at a case by case level.

Methods: Comprehensive literature was searched on multiple databases performed from inception to December 2019 and revealed 204 cases that received LPM with a comparison of CPM. The data of complications were extracted, screened by independent authors and analyzed using IBM SPSS Statistics for Windows, Version 22.0 (Armonk, NY: IBM Corp.).

Results: The complications of CPM were high in comparison to LPM in terms of electrode dislodgement (56% vs 7% of cases, p-value < .0001), pocket site infection rate (16% vs 3.4%, p-value = 0.02), and a lead fracture rate (8% vs 0%, p-value = 0.04). LPMs had a statistically non-significant two-times high risk of pericardial effusion (8%) compared to CPMs (4%) with a p-value = 0.8.

Conclusion: LPMs appear to have a better safety profile than CPMs. There was a low pocket site and lead-related infections in LPM as compared to CPM. However, LPM can have twice the risk of pericardial effusion than CPMs, but this was not statistically significant.

Keywords: Conventional pacemaker; Micra transcatheter pacing system (Medtronic); Nanostim® leadless cardiac pacemaker; St. Jude Medical; St. Paul; leadless pacemaker; traditional pacemaker.

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Conflict of interest statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Preferred reporting items for systematic review and meta-analysis (PRISMA) flow diagram showing search strategy.
Figure 2.
Figure 2.
Bar chart showing frequency of complications secondary to artificial pacemakers including conventional or leadless.
Figure 3.
Figure 3.
Pie chart showing percentage complications secondary to conventional (lead) pacemakers in our study population.
Figure 4.
Figure 4.
Pie chart showing percentage complications secondary to leadless pacemakers (LPM).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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