In brief , female atrial fibrillation patients more commonly present comorbidities , leading to a higher prevalence of persistent atrial fibrillation ; moreover , they refer to hospital care later and with a longer disease history .
Atrial fibrillation symptoms relate to low quality of life in female patients ; in fact , atrial fibrillation paroxysm usually presents higher heart rate , leading to preferentially adopt a rate rather than a rhythm-control strategy .
Female atrial fibrillation patients present an increased risk of stroke , worsened by the lower  oral anticoagulant prescription rate related to the concomitant higher haemorrhagic risk profile .
Trans-catheter ablation is under-used in female patients and , on the contrary , they are more commonly affected by anti-arrhythmic drug side effects
Atrial fibrillation is the most common supraventricular arrhythmia .
Its prevalence increases with age and preferentially affects male patients .
Over 75 years of age , however , female patients being more prevalent , the absolute number of patients affected is similar between sexes .
Despite this , few data are available in the literature concerning sex-related differences in atrial fibrillation patients .
The present systematic review therefore considers comorbidities , referring symptoms , quality of life , pharmacological approaches  and  trans-catheter ablation  in female rather than in male atrial fibrillation patients in search of parameters that may have an impact on the treatment outcome .
Role of gender and personality on quality-of-life impairment in intermittent atrial fibrillation.
Patients with atrial fibrillation ( AF ) report impaired health-related quality of life ( QOL ) . Differences between men and women with AF have not been described and personality attributes such as somatization ( tendency to amplify benign bodily sensations ) may mediate potential gender differences in QOL . Patients with AF ( n = 264 , 59 % men ) who participated in the Canadian Trial of Atrial Fibrillation ( n = 403 ) completed vali date d QOL question naires at baseline , 3 months , and 12 months after antiarrhythmic drug treatment .  Women were significantly older than men and a greater proportion had hypertension , but other cardiac variables did not differ between women and men . At baseline , after controlling for significant clinical and demographic factors , women reported worse physical health ( p = 0.002 ) and functional capacity ( p < 0.001 ) , but not mental health or general well-being . Women also had more frequent and severe cardiac symptoms than men ( both p < 0.001 ) . Physical health improved significantly from baseline to 3 months for women ( p = 0.002 ) , but not for men ( p = 0.066 ) . Conversely , mental health improved for men ( p = 0.007 ) , but not for women . Cardiac symptom frequency and severity improved over time for women and men ( all p < 0.001 ) . Tendency to somatize predicted poor QOL , and women had higher scores than men ( p = 0.023 ) . However , after controlling for somatization , women still had worse physical function , functional capacity , and symptom burden than men . Independent of cardiac disease severity and age , women with AF had significantly more impaired QOL than men , specifically on domains related to physical rather than emotional functioning . Personality attributes may have a role in influencing QOL outcomes
In brief , female atrial fibrillation patients more commonly present comorbidities , leading to a higher prevalence of persistent atrial fibrillation ; moreover , they refer to hospital care later and with a longer disease history .
Atrial fibrillation symptoms relate to low quality of life in female patients ; in fact , atrial fibrillation paroxysm usually presents higher heart rate , leading to preferentially adopt a rate rather than a rhythm-control strategy .
Female atrial fibrillation patients present an increased risk of stroke , worsened by the lower  oral anticoagulant prescription rate related to the concomitant higher haemorrhagic risk profile .
Trans-catheter ablation is under-used in female patients and , on the contrary , they are more commonly affected by anti-arrhythmic drug side effects
Atrial fibrillation is the most common supraventricular arrhythmia .
Its prevalence increases with age and preferentially affects male patients .
Over 75 years of age , however , female patients being more prevalent , the absolute number of patients affected is similar between sexes .
Despite this , few data are available in the literature concerning sex-related differences in atrial fibrillation patients .
The present systematic review therefore considers comorbidities , referring symptoms , quality of life , pharmacological approaches  and  trans-catheter ablation  in female rather than in male atrial fibrillation patients in search of parameters that may have an impact on the treatment outcome .