Transtelephonic monitoring of 25,919 implanted pacemakers.

In order to evaluate the behavior of lithium-powered cardiac pacemakers, a database of 25,919 lithium-powered pacing systems including 23,517 single and 2,402 dual chambered pacemaker generators were followed in 21,750 patients. Of this group, 11,319 were currently active in addition to 7,560 who died, as well as 2,871 patients who terminated their follow-up service prior to the end-of-life of the pacemaker system. A total of 23,517 single chambered pacemakers were followed for 719,173 months of pacing.

Longevity comparisons among lithium anode power cells for cardiac pacemakers.

Of over 10,000 lithium-powered pacemakers followed by a commercial transtelephone monitoring service, 148 have been explanted due to rate decline. A breakdown according to the power cell manufactures shows that the longevity is not uniform, indicating that significant differences exist among the power cell designs even though all have lithium anodes. One tenth of all lithium-powered pacemakers in the study were explanted for rate declines within 4 years.