Multi-Lead surface ECG Analysis of Inherited Cardiac Disease
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Multi-Lead ECG analysis of ventricular depolarization and repolarization characteristics of inherited cardiac diseases.
IRAS ID
144257
Contact name
Pier Lambiase
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
UCL UCL Sponsor Representative. Joint Research Office. (part of the Research Support Center)
Duration of Study in the UK
3 years, 7 months, 18 days
Research summary
The number of victims of sudden cardiac death is in excess of 50,000 a year in the UK. Death is often due to dangerously fast heart rhythms. These events occur almost exclusively in patients with abnormal hearts, in particular coronary artery disease. Despite the development of internal cardiac defibrillators which can prevent dangerous heart rhythms by delivering energy (a shock) to restart the heart, we are still unable to accurately predict which patients will develop a lethal heart rhythm. This makes it difficult to decide which patients should receive a defibrillator.
This study will investigate a new method of looking at the heart’s electrical tracing (ECG) to better predict which patients will develop dangerous heart rhythms. We will measure ECG's using the several multiple ECG lead systems including the ECGi system. Instead of measuring the hearts electrical activity in just 12 sites as per a standard ECG, this new research tool records the electrical activity of the heart over 256 separate points on the chest. We have previously conducted such studies invasively, and will use this non-invasive tool to compare with our previous data and find new non-invasive surface ECG markers. We hypothesise that better non-invasive assessment of the heart’s electrical activity will improve characterization of cardiac risk and enable better diagnosis of diseases of the heart's electrical activity which predispose to sudden cardiac death.
We will study electrical activity of the heart using multi-lead ECG in patients with cardiac conditions that carry a risk of sudden cardiac death. This will include patients with poor blood supply to the heart (ischemia); patients in which the heart is structurally abnormal such as Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy, Arrhythmogenic Right Ventricular Dysplasia or Dilated Cardiomyopathy; as well as conditions where there is an inherited electrical abnormality in the heart such as Brugada Syndrome and Long-QT syndrome.
REC name
London - Bromley Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
14/LO/0360
Date of REC Opinion
14 May 2014
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion