title: Current status of endoscopic and robotic mitral valve surgery.
abstract: Doctor C. Walton Lillehei and his colleagues set a standard for innovation and new technology development in cardiac surgery. Robotic mitral valve surgery has taken a similar translational course proffered by Lillehei. We evaluated 341 video-assisted and 100 da Vinci robotic mitral repairs done at East Carolina University between 1996 and 2004. The 30-day mortality was 2.2% and 1% for the video-assisted and robotic series, respectively. Complex anterior and posterior leaflet repairs were performed in both cohorts. Repair results were excellent. For the da Vinci group there was a clear learning curve, with repair, perfusion, and aortic cross-clamp times falling significantly (p < 0.05). This reports suggests that robotic and endoscopic minimally invasive mitral surgery could evolve to become the standard of care.
authors.affiliation: Division of Cardiothoracic and Vascular Surgery, Eastern Carolina Cardiovascular Institute, University Health Systems, East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina 27858, USA. chitwoodw@mail.ecu.edu
authors.forename: W Randolph
authors.initials: WR
authors.lastname: Chitwood
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D006348:Cardiac Surgical Procedures / Q000379:methods*; D005260:Female; D017052:Hospital Mortality; D006801:Humans; D007902:Length of Stay; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D008944:Mitral Valve Insufficiency / Q000601:surgery*; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D012371:Robotics; D016896:Treatment Outcome; D020535:Video-Assisted Surgery / Q000379:methods*