I had two within seven months. First one failed and I knew it within six days. Second one, same electrophysiologist, worked wonders and I'm free of AF for coming up to 3 years now.

Across the field of EPs doing ablations, about 25% of all ablations, first attempts (called index ablations) will fail. So a repeat is needed. Not all EPs are the same. The most popular, highly skilled, and most experienced (6-8 ablations each week for ten years or more) are likely to yield the best results, so do your homework.

As the others have said, it's an early arrival at the hospital, and you're home that evening at the latest (if they wheel you into the cath lab near noon or a bit later. Those taken in at 0800 or so will be home by mid-afternoon). So, it's rocket science, but everyone is putting up rockets these days. It's routine, pretty much like an endoscopy, except it's a thin catheter going up your femoral vein and into your right atrium. From there they pierce the septum and insert the catheter into the left atrium and commence to cauterize around the pulmonary vein ostia. That's usually a first attempt, although the more skilled and experienced EPs will take a good look to see if there are other foci where the signals are entering the atrium and causing it to beat irregularly. SHOP AROUND!!