PMID: 15222283Jun 30, 2004Paper

Which elderly patients with severe aortic stenosis benefit from surgical treatment? An aid to clinical decision making

The Journal of Heart Valve Disease
B J BoumaJan G Tijssen

Abstract

Clinical decision-making in an individual elderly patient with severe aortic stenosis (AS) is difficult. The prognosis is influenced by increased age and various cardiac morbidity and comorbidity, and the benefit of surgery is uncertain because the prognosis with conservative treatment has rarely been described. The study aim was to identify those patients who would gain from surgical therapy. The long-term survival of a cohort of elderly patients after an initial diagnosis of severe aortic stenosis was analyzed. Multivariate analysis was used to develop patient profiles on the basis of four main variables of age, severity of AS, cardiac morbidity, and comorbidity, to illustrate the benefit of surgical treatment over conservative treatment. A total of 280 consecutive patients aged > or = 70 years (median age 78 years) with a first-time diagnosis of isolated AS made between 1991 and 1993 was included. Of these patients, 120 underwent surgery. The seven-year predicted survival ranged from 6.9% to 83% in surgically treated patient, and from 0.6% to 48% in conservatively treated patients. The benefit of surgical treatment over conservative treatment was greatest in patients aged < 80 years, with a more critical AS, cardiac morbidit...Continue Reading

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