Atrial fibrillation in the Middle East: unmapped, underdiagnosed, undertreated

ABSTRACT

Introduction: Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the commonest persistent cardiac arrhythmia with an estimated incidence rate of between 1.5–2% and an important cause of strokes. Few epidemiological studies and clinical trials on the management of AF have been conducted outside Europe and North America. These gaps in our understanding of AF likely lead to sub-optimal management of patients with AF in the rest of the world.

Areas covered: We discuss the epidemiology, treatment and clinical outcomes for AF in the Middle East after systematic review of published work for AF from the Middle East. We also discuss important clinical trials on AF conducted in the West in the same period to help contextualize our findings.

Expert commentary: The few available Middle East studies suggest important epidemiological differences between Middle Eastern and Western AF populations. In particular, the Middle Eastern AF population is younger and have more co-morbidities than patients in the West. We find that significant numbers of moderate to high risk patients with AF are either undertreated or untreated placing them at increased risk of complications such as stroke. More studies in the Middle Eastern population are required to aid the development of region-specific clinical guidelines to improve patient care.

KEYWORDS:

• Atrial fibrillation
• Middle East
• epidemiology

Declaration of interest

GYH Lip is a consultant for Bayer/Janssen, BMS/Pfizer, Biotronik, Medtronic, Boehringer Ingelheim, Novartis, Verseon and Daiichi-Sankyo as well as a speaker for Bayer, BMS/Pfizer, Medtronic, Boehringer Ingelheim, and Daiichi-Sankyo. No fees are directly received personally. The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed. Peer reviewers on this manuscript have no relevant financial or other relationships to disclose.

Additional information

Funding

This paper was not funded.