Among patients who have recently experienced an ischemic stroke thought to be caused by small-vessel occlusion or large-vessel atherosclerosis, atrial fibrillation (AF) is detected more often with an insertable cardiac monitor (ICM) than with standard of care, a new study shows.

“This is an interesting study that shows that when we look more systematically with ICMs, the occurrence of undiagnosed AF is more frequent than we originally thought among stroke patients with large-artery atherosclerosis and small-vessel disease,” Ralph L. Sacco, MD, professor and Olemberg Chair of Neurology at the University of Miami, Coral Gables, Florida, told Medscape Medical News.