Atrial fibrillation, which often causes no apparent symptoms, but nevertheless increases a person's risk of suffering a stroke by a factor of five, is hard and expensive to diagnose.
They cannot yet distinguish atrial fibrillation from other types of arrhythmia, but even if that proves impossible, this camera-based method will be able to screen out those who need further testing.
They have been conducting tests at the University of Rochester Medical Centre, in New York, by pointing their cameras at people already diagnosed with atrial fibrillation, and have managed to train the computer to spot the telltales of abnormal cardiac activity.
See also atrial fibrillation.
The water current passes into the atrium and exits through the atrial opening.
Mural thrombosis on the infarcted ventricular wall or clots in the atrium in atrial fibrillation are common sources.
Atrial flutter can also occur as a variant of paroxysmal supraventricular tachycardia in overdose of digitalis, which causes the atria to beat faster than the ventricles because atrial transmission to the ventricles is blocked.
In many patients with chronic atrial flutter, the rhythm ultimately changes to atrial fibrillation.
Atrial fibrillation is a chaotic disorganization of the atrial muscle in which multiple and organized electrical impulses arise.
The condition, while not harmful in and of itself, is usually an indication of problems with the atrial conduction system and frequently results in the development of atrial fibrillation.
The block is classified as first-degree (normal heart rate but delayed transmission of atrial impulse to ventricle), second-degree (only some atrial beats are transmitted to the ventricle), or third-degree (no transmission from the atrium to the ventricle occurs).
