Ventricular tachycardia; report of a case in which "pronestyl" was effectively used after failure with quinidine.

Recently we have observed the occurrence of ventricular tachycardia in a young man, approximately three months after myocardial infarction. Esophageal leads were helpful in proving the diagnosis. Although the arrhythmia was refractory to large amounts of quinidine sulfate (by oral and intravenous administration), atropine, magnesium sulfate, and diethylaminoethanol, it finally responded, with the patient almost at the point of death, to oral administration of procaine amide hydrochloride ("pronestyl"). REPORT OF A CASE J. A. B., a white man, 35, was admitted to the Rhode Island Hospital on March 3, 1950. His symptoms, physical findings, laboratory studies, and serial electrocardiograms indicated an acute anteroseptal myocardial infarction. No arrhythmias were noted during daily examinations and his course was benign. He was not given quinidine or digitalis, and was discharged on the 31st day, on limited but increasing activities. He remained entirely asymptomatic until 48 hr. before his second admission, on June 11,