Ventricular far-field sensing to guide atrial leadless pacemaker and beyond

Abstract

Described herein are methods for use with an implantable system including at least an atrial leadless pacemaker (aLP). Also described herein are specific implementations of an aLP, as well as implantable systems including an aLP. In certain embodiments, the aLP senses a signal from which cardiac activity associated with a ventricular chamber can be detected by the aLP itself based on feature(s) of the sensed signal. The aLP monitors the sensed signal for an intrinsic or paced ventricular activation within a ventricular event monitor window. In response to the aLP detecting an intrinsic or paced ventricular activation itself from the sensed signal within the ventricular event monitor window, the aLP resets an atrial escape interval timer that is used by the aLP to time delivery of an atrial pacing pulse if an intrinsic atrial activation is not detected within an atrial escape interval.