The Suggested Electrode Number in Electrocardiographic Imaging for Identifying Atrial Fibrillation Drivers

Electrocardiographic imaging (ECGI) is expected to map the epicardial potential non-invasively and globally and identify the atrial fibrillation (AF) drivers, which may compensate for the imprecision and incompleteness of the current intracardiac catheter mapping for AF drivers.There is currently no uniform standard in ECGI for the selection of the ideal electrode number on the body surface.To determine the optimal number of body surface electrodes for identifying the AF driving source, we conducted a comparison of the relevance and accuracy of the reconstructed epicardial potentials in ECGI when the electrode configurations tested were 128, 112, 96, 80, 72, 64, 48, 32, 24, and 12.After reviewing and analyzing the results acquired from 10 individuals with paroxysmal or persistent AF, we discovered that for persistent AF, the recommended number of electrodes is 64 or more, whereas for paroxysmal AF, the minimum number of electrodes is 48.This finding can be used as a foundation for selecting the number of body surface electrodes in ECGI, hence enhancing the clinical application efficiency and usefulness of ECGI in identifying the driving source of AF.