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New research indicates a wireless device could do a better job than the Holter monitor, the standard of care for mobile heart rhythm monitoring over the past half-century.
The Scripps Translational Science Institute compared the Holter monitor with the ZIO Patch, an FDA-cleared, non-invasive, water-resistant device worn on the chest for up to two weeks. STSI, based in San Diego, compared electrocardiograph data from 146 Scripps Green Hospital ambulatory care patients who were fitted with both the ZIO Patch and a Holter monitor.
In all, researchers said, the ZIO Patch, developed by San Francisco-based iRhythm, identified 96 arrhythmia events, while the Holter monitor detected 61.
“This is the first large prospective validation that this new technology superseded the device invented by Norman Holter in 1949,” said Eric Topol, MD, chief academic officer at Scripps Health and STSI's director.
Topol, a cardiologist and lead author of the study, continued in a prepared statement that over the course of tracking every heartbeat for two weeks “the ZIO Service proved to be significantly more sensitive” than the Holter, which consists of a cellphone-sized recorder usually worn about the waist and five to seven lead wires attached to the chest and can only be worn for 24 hours at a time.
“For millions of people who present each year with suspected arrhythmia, this may prove to be the new standard for capturing the culprit heart rhythm electrical disturbance, most commonly atrial fibrillation which carries a significant risk of stroke,” Topol added.
