Prediction and prevention of postoperative atrial fibrillation in cardiac surgery patients

A computer readable medium containing computer executable instructions that can be executed by a processor to predict the onset of postoperative atrial fibrillation (AF) from electrocardiogram (ECG) data representing a patient, the executable instructions comprising:

• a signal processing component that determines parameters representing the activity of the heart of the patient from the ECG data;
• a feature extraction component that calculates a plurality of features useful in predicting postoperative AF from the determined parameters;
• and
• a classification component that determines an AF index for the patient, representing the likelihood that the patient will experience AF, from the calculated plurality of features.

A method for predicting the onset of postoperative atrial fibrillation (AF) from an electrocardiogram (ECG) signal representing a patient, comprising:

• determining parameters representing the activity of the heart of the patient from the ECG signal;
• extracting a plurality of features useful in predicting postoperative AF from the determined parameters;
• and
• determining an AF index for the patient, representing the likelihood that the patient will experience AF, from the calculated plurality of features.