This presentation is about sudden cardiac death, its causes and treatment.

1. ‫الرحیم‬ ‫الرحمن‬ ‫هللا‬ ‫بسم‬

2. Sudden Cardiac Death
(SCD)

3.  Sudden cardiac death (SCD) is defined as an unexpected, non-traumatic death due
to cardiac causes occurring in a short time period (generally within 1 hour of
symptom onset) in a person with known or unknown cardiac disease in whom no
previously diagnosed fatal condition is apparent.
 Nearly 85% of SCDs occur due to ventricular arrhythmias (either primary VF or brief
ventricular tachycardia degenerating to VF).

4. Causes
• Coronary artery disease
• ischemic cardiomyopathy
• Non-ischemic cardiomyopathy
• Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy
• Aortic dissection
• Arrhythmogenic right ventricular
dysplasia
• Arrhythmia from antiarrhythmic agents
• Cocaine
• Myocarditis
• Valvar heart disease (e.g. aortic stenosis)
• Congenital heart disease
• Long QT syndrome
• Brugada syndrome
• Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome
• Early repolarization syndrome
• Electrolyte abnormalities
• Sarcoidosis
• Amyloidosis
• Cardiac tumors

5. Treatment
 It involves primary prevention (preventing SCD in patients with high-risk conditions),
secondary prevention (preventing SCD in patients revived from SCD) and
cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) in patients presenting cardiac arrest.
 Traditional antiarrhythmic agents have either been ineffective in preventing/reducing
sudden death or have increased sudden death and therefore are not recommended.
 Beta-blockers, ACE inhibitors and spironolactone may be of some benefit.
 Implantable cardiac device (ICD) is the primary treatment modality in most patients.
 Radiofrequency ablation for patients with AV bypass tracts, bundle-branch block-
associated VT, arrhythmogenic right ventricular dysplasia-conditions uncommonly seen.