What is the clinical significance of Atrial High-Rate Episodes (AHREs) detected by implanted cardiac devices?
The clinical significance of AHREs detected by implanted cardiac devices is that they are associated with an increased risk of stroke. A 1-hour threshold of AHRE burden was associated with an HR for ischemic stroke of 2.11 (95% CI, 1.22-3.64; P .008). Additionally, an AHRE burden of 5.5 hours in a day, in a 30-day period, was associated with a twofold increase in the adjusted risk of stroke (absolute risk of thromboembolism around 1.8% per year). Integration of AHRE presence, duration, or burden ($ 5 min or $ 24 h) into risk scores for thromboembolism may modestly improve c-statistics of both the CHADS2 and CHA2DS2-VASc scores for predicting stroke.