[Prognostic value of the late potentials of ventricular activation in coronary disease].

Identification of subsets of patients with coronary artery disease (CAD) who are prone to ventricular tachycardia or fibrillation (VT/VF) and to sudden arrhythmic death still represents one of the major problems in clinical cardiology today. Ninety-two patients with CAD were included in this prospective study, which was designed to assess the prognostic significance of ventricular late potentials (VLP) detected non-invasively using high-gain electrocardiography and signal averaging. The results clearly demonstrate that the presence of VLP increases the risk of VT/VF and the risk of sudden arrhythmic death in CAD patients. Because of its high sensitivity and non-invasiveness, high-gain electrocardiography should be included among the various electrophysiological investigations used to assess prognosis in CAD patients.