This case series highlights that atrioesophageal fistula, a known catastrophic complication of radiofrequency ablation, can also occur with cryoballoon pulmonary vein isolation.
Atrioesophageal fistula may complicate cryoballoon PVI; extends known risks beyond radiofrequency ablation but leaves open true incidence.
Although atrioesophageal fistula (AEF) formation is a well known, albeit rare, catastrophic complication of atrial fibrillation radiofrequency ablation procedures, there are less data regarding this complication using the cryoballoon technique. We report on 3 cases of AEF as a complication of cryoballoon pulmonary vein isolation at 3 different institutions with 2 different generations of cryoballoons.
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Kawasaki et al. (2014) studied this question.
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