[Pulmonary vein isolation for atrial fibrillation : Findings from long-term follow-up].

Atrial fibrillation is by far the most common cardiac arrhythmia in humans. The incidence of atrial fibrillation increases with age and will increase even more in the future due to the demographic changes in the population. Therefore, this arrhythmia will have a growing clinical and socioeconomic impact. Although there are established pharmaceutical treatment options, atrial fibrillation is one of the major causes of stroke, heart failure and cardiovascular morbidity and mortality. The latest guidelines recommend the invasive procedure of circumferential pulmonary vein isolation (PVI) as an effective treatment of paroxysmal and persistent atrial fibrillation. This article summarizes the current long-term follow-up data after PVI.