Catheter ablation is better than antiarrhythmic drugs at cutting heart failure risk as a second-line treatment for atrial fibrillation patients, according to a retrospective study funded by Johnson & Johnson.

The study, which was published in Heart Rhythm O2, compared the incidence of heart failure in a claims database to evaluate whether patients who have previously tried an antiarrhythmic drug should receive catheter ablation or a different medicine.

Across a dataset of more than 18,000 patients, people who received catheter ablation had a 57% lower risk of developing heart failure than their counterparts on antiarrhythmic drugs.