What are the risks of death and cardiovascular injury associated with device-assisted ICD and pacemaker lead extraction?
Device-assisted lead extraction carries significant risks of death and cardiovascular injury, necessitating performance by highly qualified teams in specialized centers with standby cardiothoracic surgery.
These findings suggest that device-assisted lead extraction is a high-risk procedure and that serious complications including death may not be mitigated by emergency surgery. However, skilled standby cardiothoracic surgery is essential when performing pacemaker and ICD lead extractions. Although the incidence of these complications is unknown, the results of our study imply that device-assisted lead extractions should be performed by highly qualified physicians and their teams in specialized centres.
Hauser et al. (Fri,) studied this question.