Patent ID: 7177679

Claim:
A cardiac rhythm management device for stimulating a ventricle of a patient's heart, said rhythm management device including: (a) circuitry for sensing and tracking independently atrial and ventricular depolarization events; (b) stimulation device for delivering an electrical stimulus to at least one of an atrium and ventricle of a heart; (c) a timing circuit for associating with a lapsed time the sensed and tracked depolarization events and delivery of electrical stimulus; and (d) a controller having a plurality of timing and pacing intervals including the intervals selected from the group consisting of Atrial Maximum Tracking Rate (AMTR) interval, Post Ventricular Atrial Refractory Period (PVARP) interval, Sensed Atrial to Ventricular delay (SAV) interval, and Sensed Post Ventricular Atrial Refractory Period (S-PVARP) interval, said controller electrically coupled to said circuitry for sensing and tracking, said stimulation device, and said timing circuit, wherein said controller sets said PVARP interval equal to said S-PVARP interval for a cardiac cycle after sensing the intrinsic ventricular depolarization, and further wherein a time associated with said S-PVARP is less than a time associated with an initial PVARP included in said controller, said controller further including an initial AMTR interval and a time interval between sensing the ventricular depolarization and ventricular pacing (RV interval), wherein said controller sets said AMTR interval equal to said RV interval for the cardiac cycle, wherein a time associated with said RV interval is less than a time associated with said initial AMTR interval.