The Journal of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery, Vol 75, 599-605, Copyright © 1978 by The American Association for Thoracic Surgery and The Western Thoracic Surgical Association
Evaluation of the in vivo function of the Hancock porcine xenograft in the aortic position
A Johnson, S Thompson, WV Vieweg, P Daily, J Oury and K Peterson
We evaluated the vivo hemodynamic function of the stent-mounted
glutaraldehyde-fixed porcine xenograft in 23 patients who had undergone
aortic valve replacement from 2 days to 24 months prior to the study.
Functional aortic valve orifice areas for the porcine xenograft ranged from
0.58 to 3.0 sq. cm., the average area being 1.36 sq. cm. Six patients had
calculated prosthetic valve orifice areas less than 1.0 sq. cm. Valve
orifice area did not correlate significantly with valve size or the time
interval from surgery to postoperative study. Left ventricular stroke
volume showed a significant, positive correlation with calculated xenograft
orifice area. Systemic thromboembolism was not encountered. One patient
required reoperation for xenograft stenosis caused by dense fibrin
deposition on the aortic leaflets. We conclude that use of the
stent-mounted glutaraldehyde-fixed porcine xenograft can be associated with
significant functional stenosis which may be related to annulus size or
inertial properties of the valve. These factors should be taken into
consideration when considering use of the stent-mounted
glutaraldehyde-fixed porcine xenograft in individual patients.