Repair Versus Replacement for Ischemic Mitral Regurgitation

This study was undertaken to compare the outcome in patients with moderate to severe ischemic mitral regurgitation (IMR) undergoing coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) with either mitral valve repair or mitral valve replacement. Between March 2002 and February 2005, 49 consecutive patients (mean age: 62.84±8.42 years; mean EuroSCORE: 10.03±3.12) with coronary artery disease and moderate to severe IMR underwent CABG plus mitral valve replacement or mitral valve repair. The patients with annulus dilatation were more likely to undergo repair. The mean follow-up period was 18.89±2.1 months. 40.8% of the patients underwent CABG plus mitral valve replacement, and 59.2% had CABG concomitant with mitral valve repair. The total rate of mortality in our population was 14.9% (7 patients) including 10.3% (3 patients) early mortalities; all the deceased patients were in the repair group. Both groups had a similar EuroSCORE, but more patients in the repair group had a recent episode of unstable angina (65.5% vs. 35.0%, respectively; P=0.035) and diabetes mellitus (44.8% vs. 10.0%, respectively; P=0.009). After the follow-up period, in the repair group, 11.5% had no features of Mitral regurgitation (MR); while 50% had mild MR, 23.1% moderate MR, 11.5% moderately severe MR, and 3.8% severe MR. Overall, 68.9% had no or mild MR, which we defined as successful repair, and 31.1% had moderate to severe MR. Success of repair and mortality were not statistically related to preoperative ejection fraction (39.2±7.8% vs. 32.5±8.5%; P=0.057). Early mortality was higher in the repair group than that in the replacement group, but this may have been due to the higher frequency of diabetes mellitus and unstable angina in the former group. Future studies are required to determine the benefit of repair versus replacement concomitant with CABG in IMR patients.