The diagnosis of unexplained cardiac arrest could soon become obsolete, as so-called molecular autopsy can now be used to identify its underlying causes. The current view of this subject is discussed, and some personal opinions are presented on the assessment of survivors of sudden cardiac arrest and relatives of individuals who do not survive.
This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution
Access options
Subscribe to this journal
Receive 12 print issues and online access
$209.00 per year
only $17.42 per issue
Buy this article
- Purchase on Springer Link
- Instant access to full article PDF
Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout
References
Priori, S. G. et al. Unexplained cardiac arrest. The need of a prospective registry. Eur. Heart J. 13, 1445–1446 (1992).
Krahn, A. D. et al. Systematic assessment of patients with unexplained cardiac arrest: Cardiac Arrest Survivors with Preserved Ejection Fraction Registry (CASPER). Circulation 120, 278–285 (2009).
Ackerman, M. J., Tester, D. J. & Driscoll, D. J. Molecular autopsy of sudden unexplained death in the young. Am. J. Forensic Med. Pathol. 22, 105–111 (2001).
Tester, D. J. & Ackerman, M. J. Postmortem long QT syndrome genetic testing for sudden unexplained death in the young. J. Am. Coll. Cardiol. 49, 240–246 (2007).
Tester, D. J. & Ackerman, M. J. The role of molecular autopsy in unexplained sudden cardiac death. Curr. Opin. Cardiol. 21, 166–172 (2006).
Tan, H. L., Hofman, N., van Langen, I. M., van der Wal, A. C. & Wilde, A. A. Sudden unexplained death: heritability and diagnostic yield of cardiological and genetic examination in surviving relatives. Circulation 112, 207–213 (2005).
Behr, E. R. et al. Sudden arrhythmic death syndrome: familial evaluation identifies inheritable heart disease in the majority of families. Eur. Heart J. 29, 1670–1680 (2005).
Rong, B., Napolitano, C., Bloise, R., Monteforte, N. & Priori, S. G. Yield of genetic screening in inherited cardiac channelopathies: how to prioritize access to genetic testing. Circ. Arrhythmia Electrophysiol. 2, 6–15 (2009).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Competing interests
The author declares no competing financial interests.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Priori, S. Unexplained sudden cardiac death—back to clinical evaluation. Nat Rev Cardiol 6, 678–679 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrcardio.2009.174
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nrcardio.2009.174
This article is cited by
-
Uses of cardiomyocytes generated from induced pluripotent stem cells
Stem Cell Research & Therapy (2011)