Aortic regurgitation caused by cusp bending of aortic valve leaflet.
Pure aortic regurgitation (AR) is caused by primary disease of the aortic leaflet and/or the aortic root. However, there are many patients with AR with unclear etiology and mechanism. The assessment of mechanism is critical to the decision of surgical modality for AR. Echocardiography, particularly a detailed analysis of the aortic leaflets and root by transesophageal echocardiography (TEE), could be an important diagnostic step to assess its mechanism. In this report, we present a case of AR in which the TEE images led to diagnosis of cusp bending of aortic leaflet without specific findings indicating this pathology.
Department of Cardiology, Sakakibara Heart Institute, 3-16-1 Asahi-cho, Fuchu, Tokyo, 183-0003, Japan. kshibaya@shi.heart.or.jp.
Kentaro
K
Shibayama
Department of Cardiology, Sakakibara Heart Institute, 3-16-1 Asahi-cho, Fuchu, Tokyo, 183-0003, Japan.
Hiroyuki
H
Watanabe
Department of Pathology, Sakakibara Heart Institute, 3-16-1 Asahi-cho, Fuchu, Tokyo, 183-0003, Japan.
Tatsuya
T
Murai
Department of Cardiology, Sakakibara Heart Institute, 3-16-1 Asahi-cho, Fuchu, Tokyo, 183-0003, Japan.
Shunsuke
S
Sasaki
Department of Cardiovascular Surgery, Sakakibara Heart Institute, 3-16-1 Asahi-cho, Fuchu, Tokyo, 183-0003, Japan.
Minoru
M
Tabata
Department of Cardiovascular Surgery, Sakakibara Heart Institute, 3-16-1 Asahi-cho, Fuchu, Tokyo, 183-0003, Japan.
Toshihiro
T
Fukui
Department of Cardiology, Sakakibara Heart Institute, 3-16-1 Asahi-cho, Fuchu, Tokyo, 183-0003, Japan.
Jun
J
Umemura
Department of Cardiovascular Surgery, Sakakibara Heart Institute, 3-16-1 Asahi-cho, Fuchu, Tokyo, 183-0003, Japan.
Shuichiro
S
Takanashi
Department of Cardiology, Sakakibara Heart Institute, 3-16-1 Asahi-cho, Fuchu, Tokyo, 183-0003, Japan.
Tetsuya
T
Sumiyoshi
Aortic regurgitation; Etiology; Pathology; Three-dimensional echocardiography; Transesophageal echocardiography