Twelve years of experience with the ATS mechanical heart valve prostheses

Objective The ATS Open Pivot mechanical heart valve has been implanted routinely at our institution since 1999. The objective of this study is to retrospectively analyze our 12-year clinical results with ATS prostheses. Methods ATS Open Pivot mechanical valves were implanted in 268 adult patients between May 1999 and August 2010. We selected 259 subjects who could be adequately followed (follow-up rate 96.6 %). Aortic valve replacement was performed in 157 patients, mitral valve replacement (MVR) in 71, and double (aortic and mitral) valve replacements (DVR) in 31. Mean age at the time of implant was 58.8 ± 10.6 years. The gender ratio was 128 males/131 females. Mean follow-up was 4.4 ± 7.8 years, and the cumulative follow-up was 1144 patient-years (pt-yr). Results Early death within 30 days after the operation occurred in 5 (2.5 %) patients. Late death occurred in 27 patients including valve-related deaths in 13. The 10-year survival rate after the operation was 82.7 ± 2.9 %. The rate of freedom from valve-related death was 92.2 ± 2.2 %. The incidence of valve-related complications was 2.19 %/pt-yr. Of these, the incidence of thromboembolic events and that of bleeding complications were 1.22 and that 0.87 %/pt-yr. The incidence of valve thrombosis was 0.09 %/pt-yr. No structural valve deterioration was observed in any of the three operative procedure groups. Conclusions Our 12-year experience with aortic and MVR using the ATS mechanical heart valve demonstrated low incidences of thromboembolic events, bleeding complications, and valve thrombosis. © The Japanese Association for Thoracic Surgery 2012.