Book Review

Cardiac Mapping

N Engl J Med 1994; 330:1910-1911June 30, 1994

Article

Cardiac Mapping
Edited by Mohammad Shenasa, Martin Borggrefe, and Gunter Breithardt, with Wilhelm Haverkamp and Gerhard Hindricks. 691 pp., illustrated. Mount Kisco, N.Y., Futura, 1993. $125. ISBN: 0-87993-550-2

Cardiac Mapping is a lengthy textbook of cardiac electrophysiology, with 41 individual chapters contributed by a variety of authors. It is divided into seven parts and covers a broad range of topics, including the theoretical basis of cardiac mapping, techniques of direct mapping with contact electrodes, computer techniques, noninvasive techniques (mainly body-surface mapping), and other miscellaneous subjects related to the mechanisms of arrhythmias in experimental models and patients. The authors are all experts in the field, and many are frequent contributors to textbooks on arrhythmia. The chapters are generally current and well written. Several are followed by an innovative section of commentary by another expert. This provides a thoughtful counterbalance and perspective on the data presented and is particularly valuable.

The title of the book may be a little misleading. Many people consider “mapping” the determination of the sequence and pattern of electrical activity for a given arrhythmia, undertaken to determine the mechanism at work and provide a rationale for therapy. In a broader sense, myocardial mapping may be thought of as the fundamental tool for understanding any electrophysiologic phenomenon; in this sense, any electrophysiologic subject involves mapping. This book is not confined to technical discussions of mapping as a tool but, rather, incorporates many chapters on the mechanisms of arrhythmias. For example, part 3, on mapping and experimental models, contains 11 chapters related to the elucidation of the mechanisms of arrhythmias, largely in experimental models.

Although several chapters in this book can serve collectively as a primer on mapping methods, the book is really addressed more to the advanced electrophysiologist with an interest in the experimental basis and mechanisms of arrhythmias. It could also serve as a useful reference work on selected subjects related to mapping; it is, in general, well referenced.

G.J. Klein, M.D.
University Hospital, London, ON N6A 5A5, Canada