On February 12, 2016, Yan Su, a famous artist and creator of the Air Force Cultural and Technical Corps, passed away in Beijing at the age of 86 due to illness. The old man passed away due to a stroke, and while remembering this highly respected old artist, it also makes us pay attention again to the common disease of stroke that takes away the life of the elderly. We have been talking a lot about stroke prevention and treatment for some time, but today we are going to talk about atrial fibrillation, a difficult brother of stroke. Nearly 80% of strokes are ischemic, meaning that the blood vessels in the brain are clogged with emboli and the corresponding brain tissue ischemic and necrotic. Thirty percent of these clots come from the heart. Cardiac cerebral infarction accounts for about 30% of all cerebral infarctions, and the cause of about 50% of these cardiac infarctions is atrial fibrillation. Under normal conditions, the heart contraction and diastole are coordinated. However, in atrial fibrillation, the contractile function of the atria is reduced, and blood in the atria is thus stagnant, making it particularly susceptible to thrombus formation. Once the clot is dislodged, it may enter the blood vessels in the brain with the blood, blocking the blood supply at the narrowing of the blood vessels and causing a stroke. Therefore, experts conclude, “Atrial fibrillation is the cause, stroke is the effect, and thrombosis is the culprit.” This virtuoso veteran artist was the one who suffered a massive brain infarction due to a stroke, developed a severe coma and eventually died unfortunately. According to the survey, one out of every six stroke patients is combined with atrial fibrillation. Patients with atrial fibrillation have a 5 times higher risk of stroke than normal people. Stroke caused by atrial fibrillation is even more frightening because of the larger embolic area, more combined diseases and sudden onset, which makes it present the ‘three highs’ characteristics of high disability, high death rate and high recurrence rate. What is even more frightening is that because of the insidious symptoms of atrial fibrillation, many patients fail to detect or treat it early, and neglect it for a long time, until they have a stroke and find out that the culprit is atrial fibrillation. In clinical practice, we often encounter patients who have already had a stroke before coming for treatment of atrial fibrillation. Although it is too late to mend the situation, it is not too late. Further, what if these patients had been treated for AF earlier? Patients with atrial fibrillation are at greatly increased risk for stroke and systemic embolic events, making stroke prevention the primary goal of atrial fibrillation treatment. Unless atrial fibrillation can be cured, only long-term anticoagulation therapy can prevent and reduce strokes due to atrial fibrillation. With the introduction of minimally invasive surgical ablation therapy, the cure rate of atrial fibrillation has improved significantly.