Atrial Function and Supraventricular Arrhythmia of the Veteran Athlete.

Supraventricular arrhythmias (including atrial fibrillation) are the most common arrhythmias of the veteran athlete and have a major impact in terms of morbidity and mortality. Although moderate sports practice has been shown to decrease the occurrence of these arrhythmias, it has also been shown that very intense athletic activity is associated with an increased risk of developing atrial fibrillation. The pathophysiological mechanism is not clearly understood. However, it has already been shown that intensive sports practice leads to electrical and morphological atrial remodeling, which could be the cause of the occurrence of supraventricular arrhythmias for these athletes.

For sedentary patients, two major tools predict the risk of the onset of supraventricular arrhythmia: the electrocardiogram (ECG) and transthoracic echocardiography (ETT), particularly with the study of atrial function by the analysis of myocardial deformities.