Mayo Clinic proceedings
-
Recently, balloon aortic valvuloplasty has been proposed for the treatment of severe aortic stenosis in elderly patients when aortic valve replacement has been declined or deferred. The natural history of these patients has not been clearly defined. Therefore, to develop a comparison cohort of patients with unoperated aortic stenosis, we reviewed the records of all Mayo Clinic patients in whom severe aortic stenosis had been diagnosed during the period 1978 through 1985 but no surgical procedure had been performed because the patient declined or the physician deferred this option. ⋯ At last follow-up, only 13 of the 50 patients (26%) were alive. A cardiac cause was cited for 36 of the 37 deaths. Because of the poor survival in this group of patients, evaluation of alternative nonsurgical therapeutic modalities such as balloon valvuloplasty is imperative when operative intervention is declined or deferred in elderly patients.