Preoperative evaluation is crucial for heart valvular surgery. This article discusses some issues that need to be emphasized: the impact of hypertension on the severity of aortic valve lesions, and how to improve the accuracy of clinical assessment; the identification of functional tricuspid regurgitation, in order to choose the appropriate surgical technique; the need for right ventricular function testing, and the use of risk scoring models, to better grasp surgical timing and indications and improve efficacy; and the importance of evaluating atrial mitral and/or tricuspid regurgitation complications in chronic atrial fibrillation, and making rational choices for interventional and surgical treatment.
Abstract： Quality of life （QOL） refers to an individual’s perception and subjective evaluation of their health and well-being, and has become an important index to evaluate the outcomes of clinical treatment in the last past decades. There are a large number of different instruments to evaluate QOL, and the 36-Item Short Form Health Survey （SF-36） is currently one of the most widely used instruments. In recent years, SF-36 has been used to evaluate QOL of valvular heart disease patients to investigate the risk factors those influence their postoperative QOL, provide more preoperative evaluation tools for clinical physicians, and improve postoperative outcomes of patients with valvular heart disease. However, it is now just the beginning to use SF-36 to examine QOL of valvular heart disease patients. Because of significant differences in sample size, follow-up period, country and culture, current research has some controversial results. This review focuses on the progress in evaluating QOL in postoperative patients with valvular heart disease using SF-36.
Early enteral nutrition after cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB) has been shown to have beneficial effects on intestinal integrity, lower mortality and also on the patient’s immunocompetence. Even in critical patients after CPB, enteral nutrition should be reasonable to start early and also be supplemented by parenteral nutrition in order to meet energy requirement. We conclude that enteral nutrition is preferable in the majority of patients with severe hemodynamic failure, but gastrointestinal complication and hypocaloric feeding should be simultaneously noticed. This paper comprehensively described enteral nutrition’s protective mechanism and effects on digestive system, enteral nutrition’s implementing methods after CPB, and problems or prospects needing attention in execution.
Abstract： Objective To summarize the methods and results of supra-annular aortic valve replacement（AVR） in patients with severely damaged aortic annulus. Methods Supra-annular AVR was performed in 5 patients between March 2008 and Dec. 2010 in Changhai Hospital, Second Military Medical University. There were 4 males and 1 female with their mean age of 46.3 years (ranging from 38 to 53 years). Non-specific infectious diseases were diagnosed in 4 patients who had severe paravalvular leakage after their first AVR operations (2 patients with Behcet’s disease and 2 patients with arteritis), and one patient had severe infectious endocarditis. All the patients had severely destroyed aortic annulus and could not undergo routine AVR. The prosthetic valves were fixed to the aortic sinus wall between the annulus and coronary arterial ostia, and the sutures passed through from the outside of aortic wall into the inside and prosthetic valve ring. Coronary artery bypass grafting was performed if the coronary ostium was involved. Results All patients recovered from the operations uneventfully, and were followed up from 6 months to 3 years. All patients were in New York Heart Association（NYHA） functional class Ⅰ or Ⅱ during the follow-up period, and paravalvalar leakage, pseudoaneurysm and aortic root aneurysm were not found by the examination of 3D computed tomographic angiography and echocardiography at 6 months（4 cases）, 1 year（2 cases）, and 3 years（1 case）, respectively . Conclusions Supra-annular AVR is an alternative surgical method for patients with severely damaged aortic annulus. The procedure is simple and effective to prevent paravalvular leakage and pseudoaneurysm formation.
Objective To analyze the causes of cardiac myxoma recurrence and discuss its clinical classification. Methods We reviewed the data of two female patients, aged thirty three and forty two, with recurrent cardiac myxoma, who were admitted into our hospital separately in December 2004 and October 2005. We searched articles with “cardiac myxoma” as the key words at www.cqvip.com, and reviewed literature of big case groups having undergone surgical operations, case reports of recurrence and literature with a followup time longer than 4 years between January 1994 and December 2008. Results We reviewed a total of 1 969 cases of cardiac myxoma, in which there were 60 recurrent cases with a recurrence rate of 3.0%, and there were 15 recurrence case reports. Data analysis showed that single pedicle recurrence rate was 3.0% (3/99) and multiple pedicle recurrence rate was 35.7% (5/14); In two reports on cardiac myxoma distributed in multiple chambers, the recurrence rate was 41.7% (5/12) and 33.3% (3/9) respectively;Average interval of recurrence was 4.1 years; Repeated recurrence happened to 9 cases (12.0%) with the most repetition times of 4 in one case; Malignancy on recurrence was found in one case; Reoperation rate was 64.0% (32/50); Six cases (8.0%) were familial myxoma. Accordingly, we advocate a clinical classification of “typical” and “atypical” cardiac myxoma. The typical myxoma refers to the tumors located at left atrium with single pedicle, rooted at or around fossa ovalis, and without abnormal DNA, while the atypical myxoma are familial tumors and tumors stemming from multiple points or multiple chambers, rooted in abnormal position of the left atrium, arising from clear gene mutation, or with malignant tendency. Conclusion Myxomas with multiple pedicles, distributed in more than one chamber, and rooted in abnormal position of the left atrium have a much higher recurrence rate. Close follow-up is needed for abovementioned patients to achieve an optimal treatment results.
Abstract: Objective To explore whether clinically mild functional tricuspid regurgitation should be addressed at the time of mitral valve repair (MVP) for moderate or severe mitral regurgitation due to myxomatous degeneration. Methods We retrospectively analyzed the outcomes of 135 patients with moderate or severemitral regurgitation due to myxomatous degeneration with mild functional tricuspid regurgitation. All patients were treated between January 1993 and March 2008 in the Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery of Changhai Hospital, the Second Military Medical University. We divided the patients into a MVP group (n=76) and a MVP+tricuspid valvuloplasty (TVP) group(n=59) according to whether they underwent combined TVP, and observed the perioperative mortality rate, degree of tricuspid regurgitation, and compared survival rate, and freedom from longterm moderate or severe tricuspid regurgitation after operation. Cox regression was used to analyzethe risk factors for longterm moderate or severe tricuspid regurgitation after operations. Results (1) There were no deaths during the perioperative period, and postoperative transthoracic echocardiography of all patients indicated that tricuspid regurgitation was mild or less. (2) Survival rate at 5 years, 10 years after operations in MVP group was 98.4%, 95.0%, respectively, and survival rate at 5 years, 10 years after operations in MVP+TVP group was 100.0%, 93.7%, respectively, and there was no significant difference in the survival rate after operations between the two groups(P=0.311), butthere was a significant difference in the freedom from longterm moderate or severe tricuspid regurgitation after operations between the two groups (P=0.040). Multivariate Cox regression showed that preoperative pulmonary artery pressure gt;30 mm Hg (95%CI 1.127 to 137.487, P=0.040 )and atrial fibrillation (95%CI 1.177 to 23.378, P=0.030) wereindependent risk factors for longterm moderate or severe tricuspid regurgitation afteroperations.Conclusion TVP is necessary for most patients undergoing MVP for moderate or severe mitral regurgitation due to myxomatous degeneration who have coexistent mild functional tricuspid regurgitation, especially those patients with preoperative pulmonary artery pressure gt;30 mm Hg or atrial fibrillation.
Objective To investigate the clinical effects and the brain protection effect of different cardiopulmonary bypass in treating descending aortic aneurysms. Methods From January 2001 to December 2008, 65 patients were diagnosed to have descending aortic aneurysm with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in our hospital. Among them, there were 56 males and 9 females whose age was between 15 and 71 years old with an average of 48.1 years. The disease process ranged from 6 days to 4 months (19.0±6.5 d ). Preoperative diagnosis showed that there were 41 cases of DeBakey type Ⅲinterlayer, 9 cases of Marfan syndrome with postoperative complications of type Ⅲ interlayer, 7 cases of pseudoaneurysm and 8 cases of true aneurysm. We adopted artificial blood vessel repair patch to repair the damaged point of the descending aorta in 2 cases, performed vascular aneurysm resection and artificial vessel replacement on 63 patients, and carried out descending aorta replacement and intercostal artery grafting in 18 cases. Results Among the 65 cases of cardiopulmonary bypass patients, there were 13 cases of left heart bypass, 12 cases of heart bypass, 30 cases of deep hypothermic circulatory arrest (DHCA) with total body retrograde perfusion (TBRP) and 10 cases of modified separate perfusion of upper and low body. Cardiopulmonary bypass time, DHCA time, retrograde perfusion time, upper body circulatory arrest time and low body circulatory arrest time were respectively 51-212 min, 18-75min, 18-73 min, 21-31 min, and 39-67 min. No death occurred during the operation, and there were no brain complications or complications of paralysis among all the patients. Two patients died after operation because of renal failure. Conclusion Good results can be achieved by selecting different method of cardiopulmonary bypass based on the anatomical location and range of the thoracic descending aortic aneurysms. The selection criteria should be favorable to the surgical operation and organ protection.