SYSTEM FOR DETECTING ATRIAL FIBRILLATION NOTWITHSTANDING HIGH AND VARIABLE VENTRICULAR RATES

摘要

There is disclosed an implanted atrial defibrillator (30) for applying cardiovert electrical energy to the atria of a heart (16) when the atria are in need of cardio-vert. The atrial defibrillator includes a sense channel (36) adapted to be associated with at least one atrium of the heart to provide a cardiac signal during a plurality of cardiac cycles of the heart, and a timer (66, 68) which determines a cardiac interval duration for each of the cardiac cycles. The defibrillator further includes an atrial detector (60) for analyzing the cardiac signal provided by the sense channel during selected ones of the cardiac cycles, wherein each one of the selected ones of the cardiac cycles has a cardiac interval greater than a predetermined duration.