Doctors & patients are saying about 'A-Fib.com'...

"A-Fib.com is a great web site for patients, that is unequaled by anything else out there."

Dr. Douglas L. Packer, MD, FHRS, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN

"Jill and I put you and your work in our prayers every night. What you do to help people through this [A-Fib] process is really incredible."

Jill and Steve Douglas, East Troy, WI

“I really appreciate all the information on your website as it allows me to be a better informed patient and to know what questions to ask my EP.

Faye Spencer, Boise, ID, April 2017

“I think your site has helped a lot of patients.”

Dr. Hugh G. Calkins, MD Johns Hopkins,
Baltimore, MD

Doctors & patients are saying about 'Beat Your A-Fib'...

"If I had [your book] 10 years ago, it would have saved me 8 years of hell.”

Roy Salmon, Patient, A-Fib Free,
Adelaide, Australia

"This book is incredibly complete and easy-to-understand for anybody. I certainly recommend it for patients who want to know more about atrial fibrillation than what they will learn from doctors...."

Pierre Jaïs, M.D. Professor of Cardiology, Haut-Lévêque Hospital, Bordeaux, France

"Dear Steve, I saw a patient this morning with your book [in hand] and highlights throughout. She loves it and finds it very useful to help her in dealing with atrial fibrillation."

Dr. Wilber Su,
Cavanaugh Heart Center, Phoenix, AZ

"...masterful. You managed to combine an encyclopedic compilation of information with the simplicity of presentation that enhances the delivery of the information to the reader. This is not an easy thing to do, but you have been very, very successful at it."

Ira David Levin, heart patient,
Rome, Italy

"Within the pages of Beat Your A-Fib, Dr. Steve Ryan, PhD, provides a comprehensive guide for persons seeking to find a cure for their Atrial Fibrillation."

Walter Kerwin, MD, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA

2017 AF Symposium: Three New Reports—Genetic A-Fib and LIVE Streaming Video Ablations

Published February 20, 2017

To my 2017 AF Symposium Overview, I added how we observed in-progress A-Fib procedures via streaming video from five locations spanning the globe, and heard from the EPs performing the ablations. Continue to the Video Overview…

Report 11: LIVE! Ablation Using CardioFocus Laser Balloon

CardioFocus HeartLight Laser Balloon catheter

Video streaming from Na Homolce Hospital in Prague, The Czech Republic. Drs. Peter Neuzil, Jan Petru and Jan Skoda did an ablation using the CardioFocus HeartLight Endoscopic Visually Guided Laser Balloon (FDA approved April 4, 2016).

The doctors showed how they could directly see the Pulmonary Vein opening they were ablating (unlike RF and CryoBalloon systems). The center of the catheter has an endoscopic (looking inside) camera.

(To me, this is a major advantage and ground-breaking improvement for patients.)

Read more of my report, and see a short video clip with an actual view of the pulmonary veins during an ablation. …Continue reading my report….

Report 10: LIVE! Two Procedures—but Different Left Atrial Appendage Occlusion Devices

Featuring the Amplatz Amulet from St. Jude Medical and the LAmbre from LifeTech Scientific.

Amplatz Amulet occlusion device by St. Jude Medical

Live from Milan, we watched the doctors insert an Amplatz Amulet into the LAA of a 78-year-old women who had a high risk of bleeding.

These doctors did something I had never seen before. They made a physical model of the woman’s LAA, then showed how the Amplatz Amulet fit into the model. This helped AF Symposium attendees see how the Amplatz Amulet actually worked. …Continue reading my report…

Report 9: World-Wide Studies on Genetic A-Fib

Dr. Patrick Ellinor of Mass. General Hospital, Boston MA, reported the biggest news is that A-Fib genetic research is increasing exponentially. The AFGen Consortium website lists 37 different studies and world-wide institutions studying A-Fib genetics with over 70,000 cases. Within the next 10 years, Dr. Ellinor and his colleagues hope to identify over 100 different genetic loci for A-Fib.

Dr. Ellinor reported that using a genetic “fingerprint” of A-Fib helps to identify those patients at the greatest risk of a stroke. (There’s a 40% increased risk of developing A-Fib if a relative has it.)…Continue reading my report…

About the Annual AF Symposium

The annual AF Symposium brings together the world’s leading medical scientists, researchers and EPs to share recent advances in the treatment of atrial fibrillation. You can read all my summary reports on my 2017 AF Symposium page.