Analysis of the Heat Propagation During Cardiac Ablation with Cooling of the Esophageal Wall: A Bidimensional Computational Modeling

Atrial fibrillation (AF) is a cardiac arrhythmia that affects around 33 million people worldwide. A standard form of treatment for AF is cardiac ablation with the radiofrequency catheter (RFCA). RFCA generates heat through the ablation electrode, and this process can cause severe lesions in the atrial and esophageal tissues. This work presents a two-dimensional computational model that uses geometry and boundary conditions that approximate cardiac ablation conditions with a non-irrigated catheter. The paper’s objective is to simulate the RFCA and analyze the heat propagation during cardiac ablation when the esophageal wall is cooled down. The esophagus, the connective tissue, and the heart wall were simulated, assuming laminar blood flow in the heart wall. The simulated electrode temperatures were 60, 70, and 80 °C for 60 seconds with constant peak voltage. The cooling temperature was 0 °C. The results showed that cooling decreases the temperature between tissues. The temperature in connective-cardiac tissue dropped by approximately 6.51%. In the esophageal-connective tissue, the temperature decreased by about 28.22%. In all cases, there was also a slowing in temperature increase, which can help prevent tissue damage. The results suggest that the method has significant potential for improving the safety of RFCA.