Researchers analyzed the surgery outcomes of 1,386 patients who underwent a device extraction procedure due to infection at Cleveland Clinic between August 1996 and September 2012. Of this patient pool, 323 people had abandoned leads, or wires that transfer energy from pacemakers and defibrillators to the heart.
The removal procedures led to serious complications in 13 percent of patients with abandoned wires, compared to 3.7 percent of patients without them. Within one month after surgery, 7.4 percent of the patients with abandoned leads died, compared to 3.5 percent of patients without the old leads.
“Our study has shown that abandoning leads definitely complicates future treatment of infected devices,” Oussama Wazni, MD, electrophysiology researcher at Cleveland Clinic and one of the study’s authors, told Reuters.
Since the study is observational, it does not prove that abandoned leads directly cause complications or deaths, but demonstrates these adverse events are more likely to occur, the researchers said.
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