Abstract: To investigate the relationship of myocardial viability to the presence of arrhythmia in patients with old myocardial infarction. Ninety-eight patients with previous infarction were studied. Myocardial viabilitis were detected by ^99mTc MIBI myocardial tomography with nitroglycerin administration. The presence of arrhythmias was detected by 24 hours ambulatory electrocardiography. Fifty-five patients(56.1%)had improvement of perfusion after nitroglycerin administration, among them, arrhythmias were found in 32 patients(58.2%), comparing 11 patients(25.6%)with arrhythmias in the group without myocardial viability(P<0.01). The presence of viable myocardial in patients with old myocardial infarction have a higher frequency of arrhythmias.

Key words: myocardial viability|arrhythmia|old myocardial infarction