The Fascination of the Wolff-Parkinson-White Syndrome

Almost a century after its initial description, the yearly number of publications dealing with the Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome (WPW) continues to increase (). A fascinating phenomenon if one considers that already for quite a few years, we have at our disposal techniques to ablate and cure the disease. One could expect an attitude like “problem solved” thanks to ablation, and that interest in the disease would markedly decrease. illustrates the progress made since 1930. Each new publication still brings important information, and so is today with the study by Souza Mario and coworkers.

In a large cohort of patients with an accessory atrio-ventricular pathway, the authors found that older age and a left lateral location of the accessory pathway were associated with a significant occurrence of spontaneous atrial fibrillation, reaching 18.6% in the age group older than 60 years, thus almost one in five patients. Regretfully, data on the presence of overt (manifest) versus concealed accessory pathways were not available.

[…]