Specifics of technique in percutaneous mitral commissurotomy in a case of dextrocardia and situs inversus with mitral stenosis

Mirror Image Dextrocardia with Severe Rheumatic Mitral Stenosis Undergone Successful Percutaneous Transvenous Commissurotomy: The First Case in East Africa

Percutaneous transvenous mitral commissurotomy is an established treatment for rheumatic mitral stenosis. Dextrocardic heart can be affected by rheumatic pathology just like the normal heart. However, it is technically demanding to percutaneous interventions especially the septal puncture which should be done in a mirror image of the normal. Here we are reporting a 45 year old woman with severe rheumatic mitral stenosis with dextrocardia with situs inversus totalis. She has undergone a successful percutaneous transvenous mitral commissurotomy.

Therapy of Patients with Cardiac Malposition

Positional abnormalities per se do not require treatment, but in their place, the accompanying pulmonary pathology in dextroposition patients and pathophysiologic hemodynamic abnormalities resulting from multiple defects in patients with cardiac malposition should be the focus of treatment. At the time of the first presentation, treating the pathophysiologic aberrations caused by the defect complex, whether it is by improving the pulmonary blood flow or restricting it, is the first step. Some patients with simpler or single defects are amenable to surgical or transcatheter therapy and should be treated accordingly. Other associated defects should also be treated appropriately. Biventricular or univentricular repair dependent on the patient's cardiac structure should be planned. Complications in-between Fontan stages and after conclusion of Fontan surgery may occur and should be promptly diagnosed and addressed accordingly. Several other cardiac abnormalities unrelated to the initially identified heart defects may manifest in adulthood, and they should also be treated.

Percutaneous transvenous tricuspid commissurotomy in a patient with congenitally corrected transposition of great arteries: a case report

Percutaneous balloon tricuspid valvotomy was successfully performed in a 45-year-old female with congenitally corrected transposition of great arteries with severe rheumatic left atrioventricular (tricuspid) valve stenosis. Technical modifications in the standard procedure were made keeping in mind the left-handed ventricular loop, left and anterior aorta, wedged pulmonary valve between the interatrial septum and the mitral valve with deviation of the atrial septum away from the ventricular septum, side-by-side positioned ventricles with an added superoinferior obliquity produced by excessive tilting, and an abnormal orientation of ventricular mass in relation to the thorax, with the apex pointing slightly rightwards. A final valve area of 1.4 cm(2) and a fall in the peak/mean left atrial pressures from 37/32 mm Hg to 13/10 mm Hg were achieved without complications. This case of percutaneous transvenous commissurotomy is unique in view of the rarity of the combination of this congenital heart disease and rheumatic heart disease and successful commissurotomy in such an unusual cardiac anatomy using the Inoue technique.

Percutaneous mitral balloon valvotomy in a case of situs inversus dextrocardia with severe rheumatic mitral stenosis

The efficacy, safety and applicability of Inoue balloon technique for BMV are clearly established worldwide in selected subset of patients with rheumatic mitral stenosis (MS). However, in altered cardiac anatomy it offers technical challenges. Distorted cardiac anatomy and cardiac malpositions considerably increase the complications involved in interatrial septal puncture and left ventricular entry during BMV. There are only a few reports worldwide on successful BMV in altered cardiac anatomy using the standard Inoue technique. Here we describe a case of a 27-year-old female with situs inversus and dextrocardia, where BMV was successfully performed with a few modifications of the standard Inoue technique previously described in similar patients.

Transjugular approach to balloon mitral valvuloplasty helps overcome impediments caused by anatomical alterations

Ten patients who had anatomic alterations that cause impediments to successful completion of conventional transfemoral balloon mitral valvuloplasty (BMV) underwent transjugular BMV. They included six patients in whom conventional BMV could not be completed due to cardiac anatomic distortion; two patients with dextrocardia (one with visceroatrial situs solitus and the other with situs inversus); two patients with venous abnormalities (one with azygous continuation of the inferior vena cava and the other with bilateral iliac/femoral vein occlusion). Transjugular BMV was successful in all 10 patients (mean mitral valve area increasing from 0.68 +/- 0.17 to 1.92 +/- 0.40 cm(2); range, 1.56-2.76 cm(2)); it was quick (mean total fluoroscopy time, 10.5 +/- 2.7 min; range, 7.3-15.2 min); and it was safe (no major or minor complications except one patient who developed severe mitral regurgitation that only required medical therapy). The jugular approach to BMV overcomes many of the technical problems caused by anatomic changes that are encountered in transfemoral BMV and complements the latter approach.