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Review
. 2023 Aug 25;25(8):euad203.
doi: 10.1093/europace/euad203.

Risk stratification of sudden cardiac death: a review

Jacob Tfelt-Hansen  1   2 , Rodrigue Garcia  3   4 , Christine Albert  5 , Jose Merino  6   7 , Andrew Krahn  8 , Eloi Marijon  9 , Cristina Basso  10 , Arthur A M Wilde  11   12 , Kristina Hermann Haugaa  13
Affiliations
Review

Risk stratification of sudden cardiac death: a review

Jacob Tfelt-Hansen et al. Europace. .

Abstract

Sudden cardiac death (SCD) is responsible for several millions of deaths every year and remains a major health problem. To reduce this burden, diagnosing and identification of high-risk individuals and disease-specific risk stratification are essential. Treatment strategies include treatment of the underlying disease with lifestyle advice and drugs and decisions to implant a primary prevention implantable cardioverter-defibrillator (ICD) and perform ablation of the ventricles and novel treatment modalities such as left cardiac sympathetic denervation in rare specific primary electric diseases such as long QT syndrome and catecholaminergic polymorphic ventricular tachycardia. This review summarizes the current knowledge on SCD risk according to underlying heart disease and discusses the future of SCD prevention.

Keywords: Cardiomyopathy; Ischaemic heart disease; Primary electric disease; Risk; SCD.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflict of interest: None declared.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Causes of SCD in Western countries and Japan. From Wong, Heart Lung Circul (2018).
Figure 2
Figure 2
Aetiologies of SCD and their relation to age at presentation, sex differences, genetic aetiology, and triggers. From ESC VA SCD 2022 guidelines.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Incidence of SCD according to age and sex. From Skjelbred T Heart 2022.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Factors associated with SCD in the general population. From Ha Can J Cardiol 2022.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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MeSH terms