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An electrophysiology study (EPS) is a test we perform to determine the integrity of the electrical activity of your heart, to initiate and characterize an arrhythmia (abnormal heartbeat), or to evaluate the success of an ablation. 

Most of the time, EPS is done as part of an ablation procedure when the arrhythmia is also treated. 

For an EPS, we will thread wires from the veins in your groin and position them in different parts of your heart. Once the wires are in place, we will record your heart’s electricity flow and will pace the heart (by applying low-intensity electrical current) from different chambers in an effort to reproduce arrhythmias. 

We perform EPS to help us determine the optimal treatment plan to recommend to you in different situations:

  • Syncope – if your ECG is abnormal or echocardiogram reveals structural abnormalities
    • To evaluate for significant abnormalities, electrical impulse formation, or electrical impulse flow that might require pacemaker implantation
    • To evaluate for ventricular arrhythmias that might require implantation of a cardioverter defibrillator (ICD)  
  • Arrhythmia – already detected by the monitoring, as part of ablation procedure
    • To reproduce and confirm the arrhythmia, for which you will undergo a curative catheter ablation procedure, EPS lets us destroy the circuit or the group of cells that provoke the arrhythmia inside your heart, using radiofrequency or cryo energy.