When Arlington resident Michael Griffin, a 77-year-old retired police officer, was diagnosed with new-onset persistent atrial fibrillation in 2015, he was put on antiarrhythmic medication to help control his episodes. This noninvasive treatment plus a pacemaker worked for a time, until his episodes became more frequent and longer lasting. In 2020, he underwent his first heart procedure, a cryoballoon ablation. Griffin did well with the treatment but, again, had increasing symptoms over time.

That’s when Griffin’s physician, Theodore Takata, M.D., a cardiac electrophysiologist on the medical staff of Texas Health Harris Methodist Hospital Fort Worth and at Texas Health Heart & Vascular Specialists, a Texas Health Physicians Group practice, introduced the idea of pulsed field ablation (PFA) therapy as a possible alternative treatment.

What is Atrial Fibrillation

The risk of developing atrial fibrillation, or AFib, is a reality for about 1 in 4 adults over the age of 40. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention predicts more than 12 million people in the U.S. will have the heart rhythm disorder by 2030.

When a person has AFib, the normal beating in the upper chambers of their heart is irregular and blood doesn’t flow as well as it should to the lower heart’s chambers. Some people who have AFib don’t realize they have it and don’t show any symptoms. Others may experience fatigue, heart palpitations, trouble breathing, chest pain, and/or dizziness. If left untreated, AFib is a serious condition that only worsens over time and can lead to stroke or heart failure.

Advances in the Care of Atrial Fibrillation

AFib is treatable by several forms of ablation therapy, either thermal ablation or PFA. Thermal ablation uses hot or cold temperatures to destroy the heart muscle cells that produce an arrhythmia. In contrast, PFA is an energy therapy that creates a brief electrical field to target the abnormal cells and restore regular heart function. Texas Health Fort Worth is the first facility in North Texas — and one of only three in the state — to broaden its treatment options for AFib patients with use of the second generation of PFA technology, which was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in October 2024.

“This new technology is an alternative to the thermal ablation methods of radiofrequency or cryoablation that use heat or cold to destroy cardiac tissue associated with abnormal heart rhythms,” Takata explains. “PFA therapy uses short bursts of high energy, an electrical field that lasts from fractions of a second. When that energy is repeatedly applied, a lesion is created that isolates any electrical activity from the pulmonary vein to the rest of the heart. As a result, PFA is considered to be a safer procedure because it allows for a targeted approach that avoids injury to other structures near the heart that are sensitive to heat, including the esophagus, stomach, connective tissue like the pulmonary veins, and nerves.”

Promoting Recovery and Improving Outcomes

In the past, AFib procedures required navigating the heart muscle with separate tools: a catheter to map an image of the heart and either a catheter with RF energy or a PFA catheter to destroy the abnormal cells. This second-generation PFA technology combines all the tools into one catheter that uses both pulsed field and radiofrequency energies for a better, more customized patient experience.

“There is no need for multiple exchanges of catheters during the procedure,” Takata says. Fewer steps mean improved patient safety. A more flexible catheter also promotes more precise treatment in and around the heart, helping to reduce the risk of injury to surrounding tissue. These benefits were largely why PFA was the treatment of choice for Griffin when he was facing his second ablation procedure.

“Dr. Takata explained that the procedure would take less time than my previous ablation,” Griffin recalls. “I knew it would be a success, and I didn’t want to put it off, especially since I was having sensations of going into AFib.”

After the 90-minute procedure and a few hours of bed rest in the hospital, Grifin was able to go home. “I was instructed to limit any lifting and straining for a few days but otherwise was cleared to return to my daily routine,” Griffin says. “I have had no symptoms of AFib and I have had a good recovery with no shortness of breath or any of the other symptoms that AFib would normally manifest. I recently returned from a trip to California, where I met up with family and my grandkids, and just attended a musical that required me to walk up several flights of stairs. I did so without getting winded — that was a plus for me!”

Living with AFib

With the right treatment and regular management, many people with atrial fibrillation can live active, healthy lives. The goal of PFA therapy and other treatments for AFib is to:

• Restore the heart’s normal rhythm
• Lower heart rate
• Reduce the risk of blood clots, stroke, and heart attack

Along with treatment, practicing a healthy lifestyle that includes managing weight and addressing any potential pulmonary issues is key to slowing or preventing AFib symptoms, according to Takata.

“Clinical studies have shown that following an AFib ablation, those individuals who followed a healthy lifestyle had a 20 percent likelihood of recurrence compared to 80 percent recurrence in those who didn’t follow a healthy lifestyle. I use the analogy of a house fire to emphasize this. If lifestyle remains poor and unchanged, treating AFib is like trying to put out a house fire with the gas lines leaking and not turned off. It simply won’t work,” he adds.

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