Abstract
Early repolarization is a common electrocardiographic (ECG) feature found in young adults, men and athletes, and has been considered to be a benign feature for the last several decades. But recent studies suggest that early repolarization may be related to idiopathic ventricular fibrillation and sudden cardiac death. We report a young man, 35 years old, who had life threatening ventricular fibrillation and sudden cardiac arrest. He was evaluated for cardiac causes of ventricular fibrillation. There was no explanation other than that his ECG showed an early repolarization pattern so we treated him with implantable cardioverter defibrillator. Thus, we suggest that early repolarization may be related with life threatening ventricular arrhythmia.
Figures and Tables
Fig. 1
Electrocardiography monitoring upon patient arrival. Ventricular fibrillation is observed during.
![emj-37-112-g001](/upload/SynapseData/ArticleImage/0201emj/emj-37-112-g001.jpg)
References
1. Shipley RA, Hallaran WR. The four lead electrocardiogram in 200 normal men and women. Am Heart J. 1936; 11:325–345.
2. Miyazaki S, Shah AJ, Haissaguerre M. Early repolarization syndrome: a new electrical disorder associated with sudden cardiac death. Circ J. 2010; 74:2039–2044.
3. Haissaguerre M, Derval N, Sacher F, Jesel L, Deisenhofer I, de Roy L, et al. Sudden cardiac arrest associated with early repolarization. N Engl J Med. 2008; 358:2016–2023.
4. Rosso R, Kogan E, Belhassen B, Rozovski U, Scheinman MM, Zeltser D, et al. J-point elevation in survivors of primary ventricular fibrillation and matched control subjects: incidence and clinical significance. J Am Coll Cardiol. 2008; 52:1231–1238.
5. Antzelevitch C, Yan GX. J wave syndromes. Heart Rhythm. 2010; 7:549–558.
6. Levy S, Sbragia P. ECG repolarization syndrome abnormalities (J wave syndromes) and idiopathic ventricular fibrillation: diagnostic and management. J Interv Card Electrophysiol. 2011; 32:181–186.
7. Tikkanen JT, Anttonen O, Junttila MJ, Aro AL, Kerola T, Rissanen HA, et al. Long-term outcome associated with early repolarization on electrocardiography. N Engl J Med. 2009; 361:2529–2537.
8. Nam GB, Kim YH, Antzelevitch C. Augmentation of J waves and electrical storms in patients with early repolarization. N Engl J Med. 2008; 358:2078–2079.