St. Jude Medical‘s Quadra Allure MP, the world’s first quadripolar cardiac resynchronization therapy pacemaker (CRT-P) with the MultiPoint Pacing option, has been given the regulatory green light in Europe. The device uses the company’s Quartet LV cardiac leads equipped with four electrodes to deliver electric signals to the heart.

MultiPoint Pacing technology allows different locations within the left side of the heart to be paced, providing more options for physicians to adjust resynchronization therapy to the individual patients’ functional anatomy. This has been confirmed in a recent study comparing the technology to conventional bi-ventricular pacing therapy which showed a 19 percent improvement in the response rate when using MultiPoint Pacing. The improved ability to tailor cardiac pacing to each patient should prevent a good number of revision procedures that are often required when patients don’t sufficiently respond to pacemakers after lead placement.

MultiPoint Pacing is still considered investigational technology by the FDA and is therefore not yet available in the U.S.

source:St. Jude Medical