The Journal of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery, Vol 76, 56-60, Copyright © 1978 by The American Association for Thoracic Surgery and The Western Thoracic Surgical Association
Repeat open intracardiac operation. Analysis of fifty operations
TA English and BB Milstein
Between December, 1972, and February, 1976, 50 open-heart operations were
performed on 44 patients who had previously had open cardiotomies. Reasons
for reoperation were failure of biological tissue valves (15 cases),
failure of mechanical valves (12 cases), paraprosthetic reguritation (nine
cases), recurrent or incompletely corrected congenital malformations (eight
cases), prosthetic endocarditis (two cases), misdiagnoses (two cases), and
miscellaneous causes (two cases). Operations performed included 20 aortic
valve replacements, 10 mitral valve replacements, seven double valve
replacements, five repairs of paraprosthetic leaks, one tricuspid valve
replacement, and seven procedures for congenital defects. There were two
deaths within 30 days of operation (operative mortality rate of 4 percent)
and six deaths between 7 weeks and 3 years after operation. Postoperative
complications were slightly more frequent than in patients undergoing
similar operations for the first time. The late functional result was good
in the majority (73%) of survivors.
