Aleš Mokráček

TL;DR: The staged hybrid epicardial–endocardial treatment of long‐standing persistent atrial fibrillation seems to be extremely effective in maintenance of normal sinus rhythm compared to radiofrequency catheter or surgical ablation alone.

TL;DR: Risk factors associated with higher in-hospital mortality after re-exploration for bleeding and tamponade include delayed resternotomy, higher levels of lactate and lower levels of haematocrit before revision and other well-known risk factors such as older age, more complex cardiac procedures, redo operations, longer cardiopulmonary bypass, renal failure and diabetes mellitus.

TL;DR: The sequential, two-staged hybrid strategy (surgical thoracoscopic followed by catheter ablation) is feasible and safe with a high post-procedural success and seems to represent the optimal treatment with low risk load and potentially long-term benefit for patients with a persistent and long-standing persistent form atrial fibrillation.

TL;DR: Older patients with higher operative risk have lower preoperative HRQOL but show a similar improvement in a majority ofHRQOL domains after cardiac surgery as compared with younger patients.

TL;DR: Long-term follow-up confirmed clip stability, complete occlussion of the LAA and absence of any atrial fibrilation-related thromboembolic events, and the Epicardial AtriClip Exclusion system appears to be a feasable and safe operative method with a high success rate.