Who Watches the "Watchman" and How Often?

Abstract

Atrial fibrillation (AF) is a common cardiac arrhythmia that is encountered during the hospitalization. Sometimes, many patients cannot be anticoagulated to prevent AF-related cardiovascular accidents because of the risk of bleeding. In these cases, we recommend putting left atrial appendage (LAA) to prevent thrombus formation in the left atrium due to AF. There is no clear time frame of how long we need to follow up with echocardiogram to monitor device-related blood clot formation and continue anticoagulation therapy if there is recurrent thrombus formation after LAA placement. We would like to present a case with AF in which the patient had epistaxis, which required to hold anticoagulation and arterial embolization. The patient agreed to the placement of the Watchman device and subsequently it was complicated by device-related thrombosis (DRT). The patient required prolonged anticoagulation treatment and follow-up echocardiogram to prevent DRT in the future.

Keywords: anticoagulation; left atrial appendage occlude; recurrent thrombosis; watchman device.