https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4848-6105
An 84-year-old man with atrial fibrillation, ischemic heart disease with surgical and percutaneous revascularization, complained about effort abdominal pain and dyspnoea (NYHA III), with asthenia and peripheral oedema. Transoesophageal echocardiography showed torrential atrial tricuspid regurgitation and dilated right ventricle with preserved ejection fraction (Panels A–C). Invasive systolic pulmonary pressure was 30 mmHg. The TRI-SCORE was 30%. Considering the symptoms and signs of right heart failure despite optimal medical treatment and the prohibitive surgical risk, the patient was selected for tricuspid transcatheter valve replacement with Cardiovalve (VenusMedtech, Hangzhou, China) according to Heart Team evaluation. Repair percutaneous techniques were rejected, transcatheter annuloplasty due to right coronary artery proximity and thin tissue, and edge-to-edge approach because of the gap of 1 cm.
The 32-F Large Cardiovalve system was inserted via surgically exposed femoral vein and was advanced into the right atrium. Under transesophageal echocardiographic and fluoroscopic guidance, the device legs were opened in the atrium and advanced into ventricle and grasp the 3 native leaflets by pulling the system (Panel D). Finally, the atrial followed the ventricular flanges that were released (Panel E). There was a posterior mild paravalvular regurgitation (Panels F and G, Supplementary data online, Videos S1 and S2). After 1 month, the patient is NYHA class I, neither having effort abdominal pain nor peripheral oedema. CT scan showed a significant reduction of the right ventricular diastolic volume from 256 to 216 mL, and the right atrium from 89 to 71 mL, even persisting atrial fibrillation (Panel H, Supplementary data online, Video S3).
This case showed the immediate favourable remodelling of the right chambers after abolishing the overload volume with transcatheter orthotopic tricuspid replacement. This early finding could be explained by the lack of post-pericardium damage commonly seen after surgery.
Supplementary data is available at European Heart Journal - Cardiovascular Imaging online.
Funding: None declared.
Data availability: The data underlying this article are available in the article and in its online supplementary material.
Author notes
Conflicts of interest: None declared.
