DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.15947519
title: Data and Code for: Catheter Ablation for Atrial Fibrillation in Patients With Heart Failure and Reduced or Mildly Reduced Ejection Fraction: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials

description: # **Data and Code for: Catheter Ablation for Atrial Fibrillation in Patients With Heart Failure and Reduced or Mildly Reduced Ejection Fraction: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials**

**Author:** Vicky Muller Ferreira, MD  **Contact:** muller.vicky@hotmail.com  **Date of Deposit:** July 15, 2025

## **1\. Description**

This repository contains the full dataset and R code required to reproduce the analyses presented in the systematic review and meta-analysis titled "Catheter Ablation for Atrial Fibrillation in Patients With Heart Failure and Reduced or Mildly Reduced Ejection Fraction: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials".  The study synthesizes evidence from nine randomized controlled trials (RCTs) to compare the efficacy of catheter ablation versus conventional medical therapy on major clinical outcomes, including all-cause mortality, heart failure hospitalizations, and changes in left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF).  The PROSPERO registration number for this review is **CRD420251105266**.

## **2\. Related Publication**

\[A full citation will be added here upon publication of the manuscript.\]

## **3\. Contents of the Repository**

This repository is organized as follows:

* **README.md**: This file, providing an overview of the repository contents and instructions for use.  * **data/**: A directory containing the dataset used for the analysis.    * ablation\_hf\_dataset.csv: A CSV file containing the extracted data from all included studies for each outcome (mortality, HF hospitalizations, LVEF change, and MLHFQ score).  * **code/**: A directory containing the R script for the analysis.    * meta\_analysis\_script.R: The complete R script that performs all meta-analyses, generates forest plots, conducts sensitivity and subgroup analyses, and assesses publication bias.  * **output/**: A directory containing the figures generated by the R script.    * Forest\_Plot\_Mortality.pdf    * Forest\_Plot\_HF\_Hospitalization.pdf    * Forest\_Plot\_LVEF\_Change.pdf    * Forest\_Plot\_MLHFQ\_Change.pdf    * Funnel\_Plot\_Mortality.pdf

## **4\. Software and Packages**

The analysis was conducted using **R (version 4.3.1 or later)**.  The following R packages are required to run the script. They can be installed from CRAN using the install.packages() command.

* meta (version 6.5-0 or later)  * metafor  * dplyr

You can install all required packages by running the following command in your R console:  install.packages(c("meta", "metafor", "dplyr"))

## **5\. How to Reproduce the Analysis**

1. **Download the Repository:** Download all files from this Zenodo repository and place them in a single project folder on your local machine.  2. **Set Working Directory:** Open the meta\_analysis\_script.R file in RStudio. It is recommended to set your working directory to the location of the script file.  3. **Run the Script:** Execute the entire R script by clicking the "Source" button in RStudio or by running source("meta\_analysis\_script.R") in the console.

The script will automatically load the data, perform all statistical analyses, print summary results to the console, and save the output figures as PDF files in the output/ directory.

## **6\. License**

This work is licensed under the **Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0)**. You are free to share and adapt this material for any purpose, even commercially, as long as you give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made.