Catheter Ablation Versus Thoracoscopic Ablation to Patients With Permanent Atrial Fibrillation

Patents with atrial fibrillation can be treated with the purpose of curing the arrhythmia.This may be achieved by catheter ablation and Maze surgery where the latter includes open heart surgery. By catheter ablation the arrhythmia can be cured in about 70 % of patients who have episodes of atrial fibrillation. In patients with permanent atrial fibrillation the results are not as good. We will compare a conventional ablation approach where lesions are created on the inside of the heart with a thoracoscopic approach where the lesions are created from the outside of the heart.