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Critical Cardiac Case 2

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Okay. So this is this is

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the second case. This is a patient who underwent mitral

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valve replacement. You can

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see the mitral valve here and I'm just gonna

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let this play.

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so this gentleman had mitral valve replacement and we

0:19

were asked to evaluate the

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mechanical mitral valve

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this is a cine obtained from a retrospectively gated CTA.

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So my question now for you

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is again, what is the most likely diagnosis? And if I could please ask

0:38

Ashley to bring up the poll?

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Is this a normal appearance?

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Is their valve to Hisense is their

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valve disintegration meaning the valves is

0:50

just falling apart or is the valve simply not functioning is

0:53

their valve valve malfunction. Excellent. Wonderful.

0:58

So nobody thinks it's normal that's good, which actually reminds

1:01

me maybe I should just show normal case because people expect to

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see something at normal and nobody

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thinks that there's valve integration that is

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also correct because it would be extremely unlikely for

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these valves just to fall apart these valves have a shelf life

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where basically an expected life expectancy of thousands

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of years on the based on Benchmark bench

1:23

testing, but these

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valves can be hiss and these can't valves can

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malfunction and this is absolutely correct. And you

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know, I was a little bit unfair to some degree because I

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only gave you this image and this is basically the message that I

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want to send out here.

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because

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so this is how these valves look before they

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get implanted. They all have a metallic ring.

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No matter what and then they have tilting discs

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in the middle and this valves that is shown

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is one of the Saint Jude with the tilting discs

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in the middle.

2:02

And remember as with everything in Radiology one

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view is no View and the

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reason that is the case.

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Is because looking at this video?

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And I'm just going to stop here.

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Here, it doesn't look this is the video that I showed you the lower

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video. It doesn't look so bad, you

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know those valve leaflets still seem to be oriented in

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a parallel fashion, but if you look here

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On the on The View that is perpendicular to

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this View.

2:38

You can tell that this valve leaflet the superior

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valve leaflet is actually moving whereas the

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inferior valve leaflet is adhering to

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the valve ring. And again, I apologize that this video is

2:50

not

2:51

operating in terms of running

2:54

but you can see it right you can see how the upper

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leaflet is moving nicely in the

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lower leaflet is simply not moving at all.

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And also with the valves to hissins, this was actually a very good point

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that you know, some of you made that maybe this is valve

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to Hisense. You can't tell based on this one View.

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And the reason why I'm going to say this is that whenever

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you assess valve malfunction number

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one, it is critical.

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To evaluate those valves with retrospective ligated studies

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because a prospectively gated study

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meaning that you're only acquiring a

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short period of the cardiac cycle will not show

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you the full functionality of the valve. That's

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one thing. The other thing is that when you assess those

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vows, you really need cross-sectional oblique

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images to look at the

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valve in all planes. So you want to look at the

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valve on fast as we are doing it here, but you

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certainly want to look at the valve with respect

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to the hinges and you want to look at the valve

3:59

on in laterally so that you can see

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potential valve malfunction and

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valve leaflet lack of motion, which

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you would have otherwise not seen.

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Now values of dehiscence also a very

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feared complication would be would be

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present. If this outer ring the

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outer stiff ring would be

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moving during the acquisition because that would

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basically mean that the Stitch with which the valve is held

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in place.

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In the cardiac wall at the level of the each

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of ventricular Junction is no longer

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there. It's basically unraveled and

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then the valve just swivels up and down and is

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like it's like a flag in the wind that

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is not the case here. If you look at it the ring stays nicely

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in place and does move.

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But the problem is that the leaflet the superior

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leaflet is not moving and the

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inferior leaflet. Sorry, the superior leaflet is moving

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and yet the inferior lean is not moving.

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And remember again one view is

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no view. So you really want to make sure that you get the

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cross-sectional obliques.

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And when you report these in your report, you want

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to be very descriptive you obviously want to talk about the Integrity of

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the valve.

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You want to talk about the Integrity of the Stitch within

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the valve annulus? So you say that the

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valve is in appropriately positioned without motion

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with respect to the valular annulus

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and then you want to describe whether the

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leaflets are moving or not. And if

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they're not moving you want to describe which of the

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leaflets are not moving and I do

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it usually in a very descriptive way. Like I did it

5:44

with you that I see the superior one the inferior

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one and I describe it. Sometimes you can

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actually see filling the effects surrounding the valve

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leaflets almost a pen is like filling the

5:56

effect because that's what it is. It usually is a

5:59

penis that made this leaflet stuck

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to the ring.

6:03

Oftentimes it's impatient who may

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be a little bit. Let's say less than 100% compliant

6:09

with their anticoagulation. But we

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also had this impatients were 100% compliant with

6:15

their with their coagulation and sometimes you

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have two vowels and I'm just going to

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show you this as an example. So this is a patient who had a mitral valve

6:24

and an aortic valve both

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of which are mechanical valves replaced and if

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you look at this you can see

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that the mitral valve is moving.

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Appropriately, see how they tilt up and down, but

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if you look closely in the aortic valve and it's

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stuck again, we're in this we're having the same problem.

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See how the aortic valve leaflet the lateral

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the one towards the directed towards

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the left atrium is not moving. Where's

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the anterior one is moving.

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So again, you want to describe this you want to say that the

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mitral leaflets are moving appropriately yet

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with the aortic valve leaflet. The

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anterior leaflet is moving appropriately in

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the posterior leaflet is stuck.

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Be descriptive and with

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these things I tend to call my cardiac surgeons the

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ones that I'm working with, they really appreciate the

7:23

call and it's often easier to

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walk them through now with WebEx

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and all the availability of telecommunication. I

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I found myself even inviting

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them to a WebEx and showing them the images so that

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they can visualize what's going on that has

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been greatly appreciated in the past.

Report

Faculty

Cristina Fuss, MD

Associate Professor & Section Chief Cardiothoracic Imaging

Oregon Health & Science University

Tags

Iatrogenic

Cardiac valves

Cardiac

CTA

Acquired/Developmental