Life‐Threatening Ventricular Tachyarrhythmias Associated with Holiday Heart Syndrome: Treatment with the Automatic Implantable Cardioverter Defibrillator

Holiday heart syndrome is defined as the occurrence of cardiac arrhythmia in aicohol users without overt heart disease after the ingestion of alcohol. Additionally, alcohol has been implicated as a potential etiology of sudden cardiac death in susceptible individuals. We report on a 53‐year‐old black woman with mild nonischemic dilated congestive cardiomyopathy and alcohol‐provoked ventricular tachyarrhythmias who received an automatic implantable Cardioverter defibrillator (AICD). She subsequently had recurrent cardiac arrest during bouts of alcohol intoxication and with out‐of‐hospital AICD rescue. Electrophysiological study using alcohol infusion confirmed alcohol as the etiology of arrhythmogenicity. We propose that holiday heart be expanded to include people with overt heart disease. These individuals have a high risk of sudden cardiac death after alcohol ingestion, irrespective of underlying cardiac substrate; the AICD is an effective back‐up modality of therapy.