Atrial Fibrillation (AF)

1. Introduction Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common sustained cardiac arrhythmia, affecting more than 5% of the worldwide population [1]. It is associated with a high risk of thromboembolic events, including stroke, which occurs in about 23% of AF patients, older than 80 years [2, 3]. Over the last decade, it accounted for about one third of hospital admissions for cardiac arrhythmias [4, 5] with an increasing prevalence in patients with cardiovascular problems, such as valvular heart disease, heart failure (HF), and coronary artery disease (CAD) [6, 7].
The pharmacological management of AF targets either rate control (maintaining the heart rate at normal levels, using pharmacological agents, such as beta-blockers, non-dihydropyridine