[Aortic valve replacement for calcified aortic valve and annulus with ultrasonic decalcification].
We conducted ultrasonic decalcification on calcified annulus in patients with aortic stenosis (AS) using an ultrasonic operator, Sonopet (UST 2001) prior to aortic valve replacement (AVR). We studied the reliability of this method.


METHODS
From January 2002 to August 2005, AVR was conducted for AS using the Sonopet in 45 patients, comprising of 18 male and 27 female subjects. The mean age was 73.3 +/- 9.7.


RESULTS
Artificial valves were successfully inserted at the intra-annular level in 37 patients and at the supra-annular level in 8 patients without conducting annular enlargement. In the patients with narrow annuli of less than 19 mm (23 patients), the preoperative mean annular diameter was 18.2 +/- 1.0 mm, but significantly larger artificial valves with an average diameter of 19.3 +/- 1.5 mm (p=0.003) were successfully inserted.


CONCLUSIONS
AVR was proved to be safe and easy by previous ultrasonic decalcification of the annuls using the Sonopet. This method was very useful because it required no enlargement of aortic annulus.
Kikuchi
K
K
Department of Cardiovascular & General Surgery, Shimane University Faculty of Medicine, Izumo, Japan.
Higami
T
T
Imai
K
K
Yamashita
A
A
Wakabayashi
K
K
Terada
S
S
Yamaoka
H
H
Kanetsuki
K
K
Shimizu
K
K
Hanada
T
T
D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D001021:Aortic Valve / Q000473:pathology / Q000601:surgery*; D001024:Aortic Valve Stenosis / Q000473:pathology / Q000601:surgery*; D002114:Calcinosis / Q000601:surgery*; D003646:Debridement / Q000379:methods*; D005260:Female; D019918:Heart Valve Prosthesis Implantation / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D008096:Lithotripsy / Q000379:methods*; D008297:Male; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D016896:Treatment Outcome; D014464:Ultrasonic Therapy / Q000379:methods*