We found no evidence of improved survival among patients with coronary heart disease, a depressed left ventricular ejection fraction, and an abnormal signal-averaged electrocardiogram in whom a defibrillator was implanted prophylactically at the time of elective coronary bypass surgery.

All measures of RR variability were significantly and substantially higher in healthy subjects than in patients with chronic or subacute coronary heart disease. The difference between healthy middle-aged persons and those with coronary heart disease was much greater 2 weeks after myocardial infarction than 1 year after infarction, but the fractional distribution of total power into its four component bands was similar for the healthy group and the two coronary heart disease groups. Values of RR variability previously reported to predict death in patients with known chronic coronary heart disease are rarely (approximately 1%) found in healthy middle-aged individuals. Thus, when measures of RR variability are used to screen groups of middle-aged persons to identify individuals who have substantial risk of coronary deaths or arrhythmic events, misclassification of healthy middle-aged persons should be rare.

No abstract