Imbibition analysis, a polarised light microscopy technique, was used to examine the molecular organisation of collagen in normal and diseased mitral valve chordae tendineae. A single strut chorda from each of 23 valves (14 from necropsy specimens and nine from valve replacement surgery) was studied. The degree of molecular organisation of collagen in unstained 7 micron sections of the chordae ...

BACKGROUND Ischemic mitral regurgitation often complicates severe ischemic heart disease and adversely affects the prognosis in these patients. There is wide variation in the clinical spectrum of ischemic mitral regurgitation due to varying location and chronicity of ischemia and anomalies in annular and ventricular remodeling. As a result, there is lack of consensus in treating these patients....

BACKGROUND Mitral valve repair has shown superior results compared to mitral valve replacement in patients with mitral valve prolapse. Using premeasured neochordae (the loop technique) has been proposed for both anterior and posterior leaflet repairs. However, there are two major problems that are usually experienced using this method. One is deciding the length of the neo-chordae, and the othe...

Mitral valve prolapse (MVP) is the most common cause of primary mitral regurgitation (MR), which represents leaflet or chordae elongation and is frequently accompanied by ruptured chordae. In almost all patients with this entity, annular dilatation is a common lesion. It is well known that the normal annulus has a unique saddle shape, but the saddle is flattened in MVP, and its dynamic characte...

Mitral valve prolapse (MVP) results from the systolic movement of a portion or segments of the mitral valve leaflets into the left atrium during left ventricular systole. It is well appreciated today that floppy mitral valve (FMV) is the central issue in the MVP and mitral valve regurgitation (MVR) story. The term FMV refers to the expansion of the area of the mitral valve leaflets with elongat...

Isolated left ventricular noncompaction cardiomyopathy (IVNC) is a cardiomyopathy thought to be caused by arrest of normal embryogenesis of the endocardium and myocardium. This abnormality is often associated with other congenital cardiac defects. A 21-year-old man presented to the emergency department with worsening exertional dyspnea during the previous 2 months. Two-dimensional and Doppler e...

Two cases of mitral insufficiency are reported. In 1 case the lesion was produced by rupture of the chordae tendineae of the posterior leaflet of the mitral valve. In the other case it was produced by fibrous adhesion of the posterior leaflet of the mitral valve to the underlying left ventricular wall, which occurred during healing of subacute bacterial endocarditis. Changes occurred in the pul...

Described in three infants is an anomaly of the mitral valvular mechanism which has the following characteristic: connection of the left ventricular papillary muscles to the anterior mitral leaflet, either directly or through the interposition of unusually short chordae. The condition has been named "anomalous mitral arcade." The anatomic aberration appears to cause incompetence of the mitral v...

A third heart sound, followed by a diminuendo diastolic murmur, is generally accepted as characteristic of all but the most trivial grades of mitral incompetence. The genesis of these physical signs has remained controversial despite many human and animal studies. There are two main schools of thought concerning the origin ofthese sounds. The first or "extravalvar" school originated in Potain's...

Cinefluorographic analysis of mitral valve motion in intact clogs provided evidence that the motility of the valve cusps is restrained by tension exerted through the chordae tendineae throughout the cardiac cycle, except for the rapid filling phase. At the onset of ventricular systole, early contraction of the papillary muscles may play an important role in approximating the mitral valve cusps....