Percutaneous mitral valvuloplasty has been proposed as a nonsurgical technique for treating high-risk patients with mitral stenosis who are deferred from mitral valve replacement. The effect of this technique on patients with pulmonary hypertension, however, has not been fully evaluated. Accordingly, serial assessment of pulmonary vascular resistance was made in 14 patients with critical mitral...

Several diseases have been acknowledged as pathological causes for mitral valve stenosis (MS), of which rheumatic heart disease is the most prevalent. Rheumatic heart disease is a chronic manifestation of rheumatic carditis, which occurs in 60% to 90% of cases of rheumatic fever. Rheumatic fever is a late sequela to Group A -hemolytic streptococcal infection of the throat. The initial rheumatic...

Percutaneous pulmonary balloon valvuloplasty (PBV) remains the treatment of choice for pulmonary stenosis (PS). This procedure is effective, safe and gives excellent results. Pulmonary artery (PA) dissection is a rare complication of PBV. This report is a case of an asymptomatic 17-year-old male with a history of PBV due to severe PS dating back to fifteen years ago. During recent echocardiogra...

OBJECTIVES This study sought to evaluate whether supra-aortic angiography during preparatory balloon aortic valvuloplasty (BAV) improves valve sizing. BACKGROUND Current recommendations for valve size selection are based on annular measurements by transesophageal echocardiography and computed tomography, but paravalvular aortic regurgitation (PAR) is a frequent problem. METHODS Data of 270 ...

AIMS New-onset left bundle branch block (LBBB) and complete atrioventricular block (AV3B) frequently occur following transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI). We sought to determine the timing and potential mechanisms of new conduction abnormalities (CAs) during TAVI, using the Medtronic CoreValve System (MCS). METHODS AND RESULTS Sixty-five consecutive patients underwent TAVI with cont...

Mitral stenosis (MS) is the most important long-term sequel of rheumatic fever (RF). MS is associated with deterioration of the functional status of the patients and worsens their long-term prognosis. Percutaneous balloon mitral valvuloplasty (BMV) is an effective and safe method in treating rheumatic MS when performed by an experienced operator in a carefully selected patient. A successful BMV...

critical pulmonary valve stenosis (cpvs) and atrial septal defect (asd) is an uncommon form of congenital heart disease. concurrent transcatheter pulmonary valvuplasty and closure of secundum atrial septal defect appears to be an interesting alternative to surgical correction. we present the simultaneous balloon valvuloplasty of critical pulmonary stenosis (ps) with supra systemic right ventric...