title: Patient selection for TAVI 2015 - TAVI in low-risk patients: fact or fiction?
abstract: For decades, surgical aortic valve replacement (SAVR) has been the standard treatment for severe aortic stenosis (AS). With the clinical introduction of the concept of transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI), a rapid development took place and, based on the results of landmark randomised controlled trials, within a few years TAVI became first-line therapy for inoperable patients with severe AS and an alternative to SAVR in operable high-risk patients. Indeed, data from a recent randomised controlled trial suggest that TAVI is superior to SAVR in higher-risk patients with AS. New TAVI devices have been developed to address current limitations, to optimise results further and to minimise complications. First results using these second-generation valves are promising. However, no data from randomised controlled trials assessing TAVI in younger, low-risk patients are yet available. While we await the results of trials addressing these issues (e.g., SURTAVI [NCT01586910] and PARTNER II [NCT01314313]), recent data from TAVI registries suggest that treatment of low-risk patients is already fact and no longer fiction.
authors.affiliation: Department of Internal Medicine/Cardiology, Heart Center, University of Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany.
authors.forename: Stephan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Haussig
authors.forename: Axel
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Linke
mesh_terms: D001021:Aortic Valve / Q000503:physiopathology; D001024:Aortic Valve Stenosis / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000628:therapy*; D006328:Cardiac Catheterization / Q000009:adverse effects / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods*; D019317:Evidence-Based Medicine; D006350:Heart Valve Prosthesis; D019918:Heart Valve Prosthesis Implantation / Q000009:adverse effects / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D018579:Patient Selection; D011474:Prosthesis Design; D018570:Risk Assessment; D012307:Risk Factors; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D016896:Treatment Outcome