[Correlation of preoperative hemodynamics on late postoperative outcome in chronic aortic insufficiency]

92 patients with severe chronic aortic regurgitation underwent surgery between 1973 and 1977. Patients with coronary artery disease and significant postoperative prosthesis dysfunction were excluded from the study. The overall mortality during the follow-up (1.5-7 years, average 3.5 years) was 8.7%. It was not higher in patients undergoing reoperation or additional operation for aneurysm of the aorta ascendens. The preoperative left ventricular ejection fraction, end-diastolic volume index and end-diastolic pressure, and the cardiac index and cardio-thoracic ratio in chest roentgenogram, did not reliably predict a fatal late outcome. The late postoperative outcome in patients with severely impaired left ventricular ejection fraction (less than 40%), high enddiastolic pressure (greater than 25 mm Hg), low cardiac index (less than 2.2 l/min/m2) and high cardio-thoracic ratio (greater than 0.60) was not worse than in the entire group of patients. Higher postoperative mortality was seen only in patients with a severely elevated left ventricular end-diastolic volume index (greater than 220 ml/m2).