Heart Disease: Treating Arrhythmias with Ablation Ablation is
used to treat abnormal heart rhythms, or arrhythmias. The type
of arrhythmia and the presence of other heart disease will
determine whether ablation can be performed surgically or non-
surgically. Non-surgical ablation, used for many types of
arrhythmias, is performed in a special lab called the
electrophysiology (EP) laboratory. During this non-surgical
procedure a catheter is inserted into a specific area of the
heart. A special machine directs energy through the catheter to
small areas of the heart muscle that causes the abnormal heart
rhythm. This energy "disconnects" the pathway of the abnormal
rhythm. It can also be used to disconnect the electrical pathway
between the upper chambers (atria) and the lower chambers
(ventricles) of the heart. Surgical ablation procedures used for
treating atrial fibrillation can be "minimally invasive" or
traditional "open" surgery and may be combined with other
surgical therapies such as bypass surgery, valve r