Warning Symptoms, Clinical History Can Predict Sudden Cardiac Arrest

MONDAY, Aug. 10, 2026 (HealthDay News) — Warning symptoms combined with clinical history can predict imminent sudden cardiac arrest (ISCA), and having a recurrent cardiovascular event is associated with increased SCA risk, according to two studies published recently in Circulation: Arrhythmia and Electrophysiology and the Journal of the American Heart Association.

Kyndaron Reinier, M.P.H., Ph.D., from Smidt Heart Institute at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, and colleagues compared SCA survivors who had experienced warning symptoms and called 911 to controls who had called 911 for similar symptoms but did not have SCA (364 and 313, respectively). The researchers found that the combination of chest pain and known heart failure predicted ISCA in men, while chest pain and known coronary artery disease (CAD) predicted ISCA in women (area under the receiver operating characteristic curve [AUC], 0.788). Both history of CAD and heart failure were predictors with dyspnea (AUC, 0.745). Seizure-like symptoms, CAD, and heart failure were predictors in the absence of chest pain or dyspnea (AUC, 0.775).

Marita Knudsen Pope, M.D., Ph.D., also from Smidt Heart Institute, and colleagues followed patients who survived a first acute coronary syndrome (ACS) or heart failure hospitalization for recurrent cardiovascular events and SCA (index ACS cohort: 2,946 patients; index heart failure cohort: 6,711 patients). The researchers found that SCA risk increased in association with a recurrent ACS event (adjusted hazard ratio [HR], 3.15) and with recurrent heart failure (HR, 1.79). The association for recurrent ACS was significant in a validation cohort (HR, 2.85).

“Near-term and long-term predictions are parallel approaches that can help us move past roadblocks we face in preventing death from this lethal heart event,” coauthor of both studies, Sumeet S. Chugh, M.D., also from Smidt Heart Institute, said in a statement.

Abstract/Full Text – Reinier (subscription or payment may be required)

Abstract/Full Text – Pope (subscription or payment may be required)