Surgery in place of Ablation

[FruitFirst]

I was wondering why most of these community s do not talk about the maze surgery?  I had one done August 1st of this year at OSU by Dr. Sirak,  I had been in persistent A-Fib and SVT for a year Arrhythmic problems for 20 years. My two brothers both had two Catheter Ablations one they killed his sinus node the other they infected his Aortic Valve, he had to have open heart to replace the valve.  After those two failures I was not going to have a Catheter Ablation.  A friend told me to look at www.ohioafib.com I did and Dr. Sirak ended my Arrhythmia problems in three and one half hours!   You may want to look at his video!

[FruitFirst]

Sorry the Cox Maze III didn't work for you.  I had the 5 Box and it really isn't an open heart surgery the only thing that is opened is the pericardium also the reason it has a better % is the ability of the surgeon to test the heart in real time to make sure he has the pathways all covered.  

[Jerry_NJ]

Merry Christmas, and congratulations on your successful treatment of AFib.

There have been a few, some very long, threads here on the 5-box surgery, I hope I recall the number "5" correctly, and it may have been the same doctor you identified. That name looks familiar.

I believe most doctors try simple first, open heart surgery being the most risky and invasive is put off to last.

I have suffered form AFib for a number of years and have had several periods of normal sinus rhythm.  

I have undergone open heart surgery for a mitral valve repair (never an ablation) and as my heart was open a maze procedure was performed to treat the AFib.  My surgeon gave the Maze a 60% chance of success due the the enlargement of my left atrium.  The maze did not cure my AFib, it returned about 30 days after my surgery.