© 2005 The European Society of Cardiology. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
REVIEW ARTICLE
Early history of the pre-excitation syndrome
The Heart Institute, Beth Israel Medical Center, University Hospital and Manhattan Campus for the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Department of Cardiology 1st Avenue at 16th Street, Dazian Building, 11th Floor, NY 10003, USA
This brief review discusses the interesting early history of the pre-excitation syndrome. In 1913 Cohn and Fraser published the first patient with a short P-R interval, wide QRS complexes, and paroxysmal tachycardia. This was followed by other cases of pre-excitation syndrome, all of which were considered to be due to bundle branch blocks. In 1930 Wolff, Parkinson, and White reported 11 patients with the syndrome, which came to bear their name. Two years later, Holzmann and Scherf suggested bypass tracts as the most likely mechanism of pre-excitation syndrome. In 1942, Wood et al. documented the first accessory connection at autopsy. Despite these early studies supporting the bypass theory, the quest for alternative mechanisms continued until the 1970s when electrophysiological studies and surgical therapy confirmed accessory connections as the mechanism of pre-excitation syndrome.
Key Words: WPW syndrome, pre-excitation syndrome, early history, accessory connections
*Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 212 420 2416; fax: +1 212 420 2406. E-mail address: pschweit{at}bethisraelny.org (P. Schweitzer).
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