Letters to Editor: Pre-operative use of anti-aggregants may reduce atrial fibrillation development rate during coronary bypass surgery

Atrial fibrillation (AF) is one of the most common postoperative arrhythmias in patients who undergo coronary artery bypass grafting (1). This complication leads to increases in mortality and morbidity rate in coronary bypass surgery and in hospital stay caused by excess usage of medications (2). Diverse experimental and clinical trials are conducted to reduce post-operative AF development rate and associated complications; however, AF rate still remains to be up to 40% during bypass surgery. The etiology of postoperative AF is not well defined, although recent studies suggest a multi-factorial mechanism, which includes oxidative stress, inflammation, atrial fibrosis, and excessive production of catecholamines, changes in autonomic tone and in the expression of connexins (3, 4).