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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2013 Jun 12.
Published in final edited form as: Circulation. 2012 Jun 12;125(23):2933–2943. doi: 10.1161/CIRCULATIONAHA.111.069450

Table 3.

Future directions.

Nr. Field Goals
1 Symptoms related to AF

  • Incidence and prevalence of AF-symptoms in different AF-subsets regarding age, race/ethnicity, sex, socioeconomic status, setting (hospital-based or community-based)

  • Concomitant cardiovascular conditions related to AF-related symptoms

  • Relation of specific AF therapies to variation in AF-related symptoms

  • Longitudinal change of AF-related symptoms over time

  • Patterns of AF (paroxysmal, persistent and permanent AF) related to AF-related symptoms

  • Utility of imaging and biomarkers to define specific endophenotypes of AF in relation to symptoms
2 Pathophysiology of AF- related symptoms

  • Pathophysiological mechanisms underlying AF-related symptoms in lone AF and in AF in the setting of concomitant cardiovascular conditions

  • Pathophysiological mechanisms underlying absence of AF-related symptoms

  • Utility of imaging to (CT, MRI, PET) to increase understanding of mechanisms underlying AF-related symptoms.

  • Relation of genomic markers and biomarkers to specific symptoms
3 Temporal relation between AF and symptoms

  • Temporal relation of actual AF episodes and symptoms

  • Factors related to absence of AF-related symptoms

  • Heritability of absence, presence and severity AF-related symptoms
4 Systematic AF- related symptom and functional status measures

  • Increase the validity, reproducibility and generalizability of the AF-related symptoms and functional status measures specifically in patients with AF, accounting for setting and type of AF

  • Relation of test performance to clinical characteristics such as age, sex, race/ethnicity, socioeconomic status, comorbidities
5 AF-symptoms as outcome measure of AF-therapies

  • Uniform and standardized measurements of AF-related symptoms in clinical trails (and clinical practice) to enhance the interpretability and comparability of AF trials

  • Relation of AF-related symptom and functional status measures to health outcomes including heart failure, stroke, and death

  • Relation of AF-related symptom and functional status measures to health care utilization and costs

  • Specific therapies or training to reduce or control AF-related symptoms and to improve prognosis

In Bold are key recommendations.