Pacemaker mode selection and survival: a plea to apply the principles of evidence based medicine to cardiac pacing practice.

Pacemaker mode selection and survival: a plea to apply the principles of evidence based medicine to cardiac pacing practice Industry sources estimate that more than 440 000 perma- nent pacemakers were implanted worldwide in 1995, at a cost of several billion dollars. In industrialised countries, sick sinus syndrome is the implant diagnosis in approximately half of all cases, and atrioventricular block constitutes the majority of the remaining cases. Other diagnoses such as neurocardiogenic syncope account for a relatively small number of implants.'