Conventional biological heart valves treated with glutaraldehyde (GA) reveal a limited lifespan due to calcification. This is assumed to be an immune response initiated process, which is not seen with decellularized valves. However, their immunological potential is still a matter of debate. Therefore, serum samples from patients undergoing heart valve surgery were obtained before (Pre), after (...

OBJECTIVE To establish whether there is more psychological distress among recipients of Björk-Shiley convexo-concave (BScc) valves than among recipients of other valves not known to fracture. DESIGN Cross sectional study. PATIENTS 137 patients who received either a BScc valve or a Sorin Biomedical spherical valve during a randomised trial between 1982 and 1983 at St Antonius Hospital, Nieuw...

Phasic right atrial and ventricular pressures and heart sounds were simultaneously recorded from dogs with normal and ectopic ventricular contractions. Heart sounds and electrocardiograms were recorded from humans. The first heart sound is significantly delayed in the absence of atrial systole. The time between onset of the ventricular pressure rise due to ventricular contraction and the beginn...

Introduction My initial appreciation of the role of the heart, in this instance the valves of the heart, in mental-emotional illness occurred in medical school, since in biomedicine at that time the prolapse of the mitral valve was associated with panic attacks and phobias. Therefore it was a simple cognitive step from that information to identifying other aspects of Heart function, the orifice...

This paper describes "how to" examine cardiac valves with computed tomography, the normal, diseased valves, and prosthetic valves. A review of current scientific literature is provided. Firstly, technical basics, "how to" perform and optimize a multislice CT scan and "how to" interpret valves on CT images are outlined. Then, diagnostic imaging of the entire spectrum of specific valvular disease...

The present study was undertaken to find an antibiotic mixture which would rapidly and completely sterilize a heavily contaminated allograft heart valve without reducing its viability. Two different antibiotic combinations were used; formula A was used for 66 valves and formula B for 60 valves. Viability of the valves was assessed by autoradiography and tissue culture, and was found to be simil...

fresh frozen plasma (ffp) and prothrombin complex concentrate (pcc) reverse oral anticoagulants such as warfarin. we compared the standard dosage ffp and pcc in terms of efficacy and safety for patients with mechanical heart valves undergoing interventional procedures while receiving warfarin. fifty patients were randomized (25 for each group) with mechanical heart valves [international normali...