Related Experiment Video
Updated: Oct 7, 2026
Transcatheter Pulmonary Valve Replacement from Autologous Pericardium with a Self-Expandable Nitinol Stent in an Adult Sheep Model
Published on: June 8, 2022
Quality of life in aortic valve replacement: pulmonary autografts versus mechanical prostheses
A Nötzold1, M Hüppe, C Schmidtke
1Department of Cardiac Surgery, Medical University of Lübeck, Germany. noetzold@medinf.mu-luebeck.de
Objectives:
We sought to determine whether the quality of life (QoL) is different in patients after aortic valve replacement with mechanical prostheses or pulmonary autografts.
Background:
Quality of life after mechanical valve replacement may be affected by the risk of thromboembolism and anticoagulation, and after autograft implantation, by the risk of degeneration and re-operation especially of the homograft.
Methods:
Two groups of 40 patients each--one after the autograft procedure (group I) and one after mechanical valve implantation (group II)--were matched for age, gender and length of follow-up. At latest follow-up, all patients underwent routine echocardiography, the short-form health survey (SF-36) QoL survey and an extensive psychological investigation.
Results:
Patients with an autograft showed better QoL scales, as compared with mechanical valve recipients. The difference was significant for both the physical (72.72+/-20.00 vs. 60.27+/-26.07, p = 0.021) and psychological health sum scores (74.71+/-21.03 vs. 64.71+/-23.49, p = 0.046) and for the subtests of physical functioning (73.72+/-22.44 vs. 62.77+/-25.42, p = 0.049), physical pain (88.39+/-19.13 vs. 73.36+/-27.08, p < or = 0.006), general health perception (64.37+/-17.88 vs. 51.86+/-22.86, p < or = 0.008) and health change (61.89+/-18.94 vs. 50.11+/-24.37, p = 0.02). The QoL variables did not correlate to pressure gradients, ejection fraction and New York Heart Association functional class. Psychometric tests revealed no meaningful differences between the groups.
Conclusions:
This study provides some evidence that patients with pulmonary autografts have greater benefit in terms of QoL, as compared with recipients of mechanical valve substitutes.
