Failure to Capture — ECG Academy Lesson

Recognize failure to capture — the pacemaker fires but fails to depolarize the myocardium. Learn to identify spikes without subsequent waveforms, understand the causes, and respond appropriately to this urgent pacemaker malfunction.

Learning Objectives

• Define failure to capture and explain how it differs from normal pacemaker function
• Identify the hallmark ECG pattern: pacemaker spike with no following depolarization
• List the most common causes of failure to capture
• Explain why failure to capture is clinically urgent
• Describe the appropriate monitor tech response to failure to capture
• Differentiate failure to capture from the other two pacemaker malfunctions (undersensing and oversensing)