Background: Atrial fibrillation (AF) burden and longest duration are important predictors of heart failure and embolism. However, burden-specific detection rates on 7-day Holter ECG remain unclear.
Methods and results: Among 25,817 recordings, 2,289 cases of paroxysmal AF and 571 cases of persistent AF were identified. Low-burden AF was common, and 7-day monitoring substantially improved detection, particularly for AF burden <10% (2.6-fold increase vs. 24-h). AF burden correlated with the longest duration (r=0.79).
Conclusions: 7-day Holter monitoring improved low-burden AF detection and confirmed a strong correlation between AF burden and longest duration.
Keywords: Arrhythmia detection; Atrial fibrillation; Holter monitoring.