Born-Again Valver

[paulk]

I'm back, and out of the hospital, spending 6 days in after surgery. A small stroke occurred during (or immediately after) surgery, but symptoms are pretty much gone now, so think I'm out of the woods. I'm told the Inspiris Resilia valve is working well. First 2 days after surgery were similar to the misery I recalled from the first time. Whew!

 

[d333gs]

The problem with valve choices is that there is still a lot of uncertainty.
There are plenty of statistics to look at but they are not available for the most current valves looking out 20 years. There are statistics on complications with TAVR but not much yet on TAVR in a previous valve. Also new things may come along. So it is tough to be dogmatic about which is the way to go.
I had an early bio prosthetic valve last 5 1/2 years in the aortic position placed in 1977. Now maybe now I would have 10-15 years. Then TAVR. TAVR x 2 ?
So right now probably age 70 bio prosthetic or TAVR. Age 60 tougher call.
I tend to be very suspicious of people that are very dogmatic. They usually are not very nuanced.

5.5years! Yikes . What did you replace it with?

 

[pellicle]

There are plenty of statistics to look at but they are not available for the most current valves looking out 20 years.

I would indeed suggest that you can expect very similar (perhaps slightly better) performance in the new valves of said designs. If one refers to type (say, Pericardial, Bovine or Porcine) you can make sound projections which would be similar. I would advise against reading "marketing" into that and just go with a baseline.

The other problem is almost nobody thinks statistically. Casino makes money, but people still think they'll be the winner. Most won't come out with more than they went in with. Same with valves, the stats are what they are, you are most likely to get the "average" ... you may get less, you may get more ...

I had an early bio prosthetic valve last 5 1/2 years in the aortic position placed in 1977. Now maybe now I would have 10-15 years.

I would suggest that you were younger in 1977 and that what I see here now suggests you may have got similar or maybe a few years more if you were under 40 then.

 

[pellicle]

5.5years! Yikes

depends on age ... you don't look young enough to suffer from that problem. It has been pointed out again and again (... and again...) here that younger active recipients simply do not get the longest time on (*hey @d333gs , I edited edited in this next word for clarity) bioprosthetic valves, but then the makers are not targeting less than 50y'olds .... they're targeting over 60y'olds.