Structural Heart Disease Specialist

What is structural heart disease?

Structural heart disease is a term for any condition that affects the chambers, walls, or valves in your heart. You can be born with structural heart disease (a congenital condition), or you could develop one over time.

Structural heart disease sometimes develops in people who have had certain conditions, such as:

• Heart attack
• Rheumatic fever
• Endocarditis
• Cardiomyopathy

You're also more likely to develop structural heart disease if you have arterial conditions such as high blood pressure or atherosclerosis (narrowed arteries). Some medications increase the risk as well.

What types of structural heart disease are there?

Some of the more common structural heart diseases include:

• Aortic valve disease
• Atrial septal defect
• Ventricular septal defect
• Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy
• Mitral valve disease
• Tricuspid valve disease
• Pulmonic valve disease

Diagnosis of your structural heart disease involves a physical exam followed by tests that could include an echocardiogram, CT scan, cardiac MRI, and cardiac PET stress test.

How is structural heart disease treated?

Traditionally, open heart surgery has been the primary approach to treating structural heart disease. Alternative interventional cardiology treatments now available use techniques like cardiac catheterization. These offer advantages over open surgery for many patients, including:

• Shorter procedure time
• Little or no scarring
• Less blood loss
• Decreased pain
• Shorter hospital stays
• Faster recovery
• Fewer complications

Some of the procedures the team at Levine Heart & Wellness uses to treat structural heart disease include:

MitraClip™

MitraClip transcatheter mitral valve repair involves implanting a small metal device on the mitral valve in your heart. The clip holds the valve closed just enough to stop blood flowing the wrong way when you have a hole in the heart.

Balloon valvuloplasty

Also known as balloon valvotomy, this procedure repairs your heart valve if it has a narrow opening. The balloon opens up valves affected by stenosis (stiff, thickened, or fused valves) so blood can flow more freely.

Transcatheter valve techniques

Transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) and transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) are minimally invasive options for treating coronary artery disease. Transcatheter mitral valve replacement (TMVR) is an option for mitral valve disease.

Alcohol septal ablation

Alcohol septal ablation is a treatment for hypertrophic obstructive cardiomyopathy. In this condition, your heart muscle expands, causing a blockage in blood flow.

If you're concerned about your heart health or you have structural heart disease and are looking for the most effective treatments, call Levine Heart & Wellness today or book an appointment online.