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Complications from implantation of permanent pacemakers (PPMs) and implantable cardioverter–defibrillators (ICDs) can be serious and include life-threatening issues. To compare hospitals' risk-standardized complication rates of initial PPMs and ICDs, researchers used administrative databases from 2010 to 2015, covering 174 hospitals in New Zealand and Australia and involving 81,304 patients.
Most patients received a PPM (n=65,711). Overall, 8.2% of patients experienced a major complication. Rates of complications were higher for ICD recipients than PPM recipients (10.04% vs. 7.76%). Among the 98 hospitals that implanted >25 devices annually, the complication rate was lower. The most common in-hospital complication was lead reoperation (1.66%…