Expediting the pathway to supraventricular tachycardia ablation

To the Editor Honarbakhsh et al1 should be congratulated on their innovative research in improving the care for patients with arrhythmias. Their paper not only demonstrates an effective community treatment strategy but also is cost-effective during the current austerity. Potential further cost savings and enhanced patient experiences could be anticipated by encouraging general practitioners to subsequently refer patients wishing for a curative strategy directly to electrophysiologists for consideration of an ablation.

Patients with supraventricular tachycardia usually experience frustrating recurrent attendances at accident and emergency departments (AEDs) prior to referral to electrophysiologists, despite our knowledge that ablations are successful in 95% at the first procedure. Similarly, many journeys to the AED are aborted as the symptoms self-terminate prior to arrival or have abated by the time of medical review. Thus, frequently ECGs fail to capture their arrhythmia and clinch the diagnosis, protracting the time to effective treatment.

The...