REVIEW ARTICLE
Electrocardiogram Changes with Acute Alcohol Intoxication: A Systematic Review
Hitesh Raheja1, *, Vinod Namana2, Kirti Chopra3, Ankur Sinha2, Sushilkumar Satish Gupta2, Stephan Kamholz2, Norbert Moskovits2, Jacob Shani2, Gerald Hollander2
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2018Volume: 12
First Page: 1
Last Page: 6
Publisher ID: TOCMJ-12-1
DOI: 10.2174/1874192401812010001
Article History:
Received Date: 07/09/2017Revision Received Date: 04/12/2017
Acceptance Date: 26/01/2018
Electronic publication date: 12/02/2018
Collection year: 2018
open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode. This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
Background:
Acute alcohol intoxication has been associated with cardiac arrhythmias but the electrocardiogram (ECG) changes associated with acute alcohol intoxication are not well defined in the literature.
Objective:
Highlight the best evidence regarding the ECG changes associated with acute alcohol intoxication in otherwise healthy patients and the pathophysiology of the changes.
Methods:
A literature search was carried out; 4 studies relating to ECG changes with acute alcohol intoxication were included in this review.
Results:
Of the total 141 patients included in the review, 90 (63.8%) patients had P-wave prolongation, 80 (56%) patients had QTc prolongation, 19 (13.5%) patients developed T-wave abnormalities, 10 (7%) patients had QRS complex prolongation, 3 (2.12%) patients developed ST-segment depressions.
Conclusion:
The most common ECG changes associated with acute alcohol intoxication are (in decreasing order of frequency) P-wave and QTc prolongation, followed by T-wave abnormalities and QRS complex prolongation. Mostly, these changes are completely reversible.