Efficacy and safety of intravenous tocainide compared with intravenous lidocaine for acute ventricular arrhythmias immediately after cardiac surgery.

In this double-blind parallel study, 99 patients with acute ventricular tachyarrhythmias after open-heart surgery were given either tocainide (50 patients) or lidocaine (49 patients) intravenously as 2 bolus injections 15 minutes apart, plus a fixed-rate infusion that started at the first bolus. If needed, a third bolus was administered and simultaneously the infusion rate was doubled. The boluses and initial infusion rate for tocainide treatment were, respectively, 250, 250 and 125 mg and 1.04 mg/min, and for lidocaine treatment, 100, 50 and 50 mg and 2.08 mg/min. When efficacy was defined as 80% or greater reduction in single ventricular premature complexes (VPCs) or complete abolition of ventricular couplets or ventricular tachycardia, no difference in efficacy between the 2 treatments was found by bedside electrocardiographic monitoring. By computer analysis of 24-hour taped electrocardiograms and a regression analysis of the proportion of patients responding favorably to treatment, it was estimated that an 80% or greater reduction of single VPCs occurred in 55% of patients during tocainide treatment and in 48% of patients during lidocaine treatment; abolition of couplets occurred in 74% and 68% of patients, respectively; and abolition of ventricular tachycardia in 87% and 73% of patients, respectively. These treatment-related differences were different (p less than 0.004). Adverse reactions occurred in 5 patients (10%) given tocainide (hypotension in 4; junctional rhythm in 1 patient; and nausea-vomiting in 1) and led to discontinuation of treatment in 3 patients.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

RCT Entities:   Population Interventions Outcomes