title: Dynamic hemodynamic energy loss in normal and stenosed aortic valves.
abstract: Aortic valve (AV) stenosis, if untreated, leads to heart failure. From a mechanics standpoint, heart failure can be interpreted as the failure of the heart to generate sufficient power to overcome energy losses in the circulation. Thus, energy efficiency-based measures for evaluating AV performance and disease severity have the advantage of being a direct measure of the contribution of the AV hydrodynamic characteristics toward heart failure. We present a new method for computing the rate of energy dissipation as a function of systolic time, by modifying the Navier-Stokes momentum equation. This method preserves the dynamic term of the Navier-Stokes momentum equation, and allows the investigation of the trend of the rate of energy dissipation over time. This method is applied to a series of in vitro experiments, where a trimmed porcine valve is exposed to various conditions: varying stroke volumes (50 ml to 90 ml) at the fixed heart rate; varying heart rates (60-80 beats/min) at fixed stroke volume; and varying stenosis levels (normal, mild stenosis, moderate stenosis). The results are: (1) energy dissipation waveform has a distinctive pattern of being skewed toward late systole, due to flow instabilities during deceleration phases; (2) increasing heart rate and stroke volume increases energy dissipation, but the normalized shape of the energy dissipation waveform is preserved across heart rates and stroke volumes; (3) increasing stenosis level increases energy dissipation, and also alters the normalized shape of the energy dissipation waveform. Since stenosis produces a signature energy dissipation waveform shape, dynamic energy dissipation analysis can potentially be extended into a clinical tool for AV evaluation.
authors.affiliation: Wallace H. Coulter School of Biomedical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332-0535, USA.
authors.forename: Choon-Hwai
authors.initials: CH
authors.lastname: Yap
authors.forename: Lakshmi P
authors.initials: LP
authors.lastname: Dasi
authors.forename: Ajit P
authors.initials: AP
authors.lastname: Yoganathan
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001024:Aortic Valve Stenosis / Q000503:physiopathology*; D004562:Electrocardiography; D006339:Heart Rate / Q000502:physiology; D006439:Hemodynamics / Q000502:physiology*; D055585:Physical Phenomena; D013318:Stroke Volume / Q000502:physiology; D013552:Swine; D013599:Systole / Q000502:physiology