T
tex4ever54
Greetings All!!
I don't really know which catagory to post this under - Pre-Surgery, Coumadin, or Valve Selection but I will start here. When I first talked to my surgeon, we decided to go with a CE Magna valve for my AVR even though I am only 50 years old. We based this decision on the fact that two years ago I had my left hip replaced and based on statistics I will likely need a hip revision somewhere in the 10 to 15 year time range. My family also has a history of colon cancer and I will need periodic colonoscopies. He feels that the CE valve would get 15+ years and that surgical techniques that far down the road will be much more advanced making second valve job much less traumatic. I left the meeting feeling pretty good about the decision.
After more time to think about it, I decided that the thought of two surgeries in my life did not sound that appealing. I wrote my hip surgeon in Belgium (Texas boy goes to Belgium for hip surgery -long story) to see if he thought the hip should play a part in the selection of valve type. His reply was no. The procedure there is replace coumadin with double doses of heparin 1 week prior and after surgery, and starting coumadin again 5 days after. Taking this into consideration, started looking into mechanical valves and decided on the On-X valve. I based my decision on their claims of better flow, new carbon technology, fewer morbid events, etc but mostly the fact that they are doing studies of aspirin only anti-coag therapy and the studies that they did on poorly maintained INR levels in patients in South Africa.There seems to be a hope that this valve could one day free me from coumadin. I had to go so far as to send a sells team from On-X to see my surgeon. He said he would be glad to use their valve and that it was a perfectly reasonable choice to make. Again, I felt really good about the decision.
Apparently, I am getting really squirrely as surgery day approaches as I am now wavering back to the tissue valve. After reading the posts about coumadin and surgical procedure post AVR, it sounds like a real crap shoot as to having simple procedures like colonoscopies, dental extractions, etc done. Plus that I had an informal discussion with a well known heart surgeon in California that echoed my surgeons first recommendation of tissue valve. Of course to further confuse me he said the CE Magna was "Old" technology and that he uses only the Medtronic Mosaic valve. He also said the surgical techniques will be vastly improved 15 years down the road.
To wind up an overly long post, I driving myself into an early heart attack (wait-that's not funny) trying to go over every option plus read the future. I will sit back for a moment and go over your thoughts on the matter. I have found in the past that you can get lots of mis-information from the professionals while the real story can only come folks who have been through it themselves.Thanks in advance for your counsel.
I don't really know which catagory to post this under - Pre-Surgery, Coumadin, or Valve Selection but I will start here. When I first talked to my surgeon, we decided to go with a CE Magna valve for my AVR even though I am only 50 years old. We based this decision on the fact that two years ago I had my left hip replaced and based on statistics I will likely need a hip revision somewhere in the 10 to 15 year time range. My family also has a history of colon cancer and I will need periodic colonoscopies. He feels that the CE valve would get 15+ years and that surgical techniques that far down the road will be much more advanced making second valve job much less traumatic. I left the meeting feeling pretty good about the decision.
After more time to think about it, I decided that the thought of two surgeries in my life did not sound that appealing. I wrote my hip surgeon in Belgium (Texas boy goes to Belgium for hip surgery -long story) to see if he thought the hip should play a part in the selection of valve type. His reply was no. The procedure there is replace coumadin with double doses of heparin 1 week prior and after surgery, and starting coumadin again 5 days after. Taking this into consideration, started looking into mechanical valves and decided on the On-X valve. I based my decision on their claims of better flow, new carbon technology, fewer morbid events, etc but mostly the fact that they are doing studies of aspirin only anti-coag therapy and the studies that they did on poorly maintained INR levels in patients in South Africa.There seems to be a hope that this valve could one day free me from coumadin. I had to go so far as to send a sells team from On-X to see my surgeon. He said he would be glad to use their valve and that it was a perfectly reasonable choice to make. Again, I felt really good about the decision.
Apparently, I am getting really squirrely as surgery day approaches as I am now wavering back to the tissue valve. After reading the posts about coumadin and surgical procedure post AVR, it sounds like a real crap shoot as to having simple procedures like colonoscopies, dental extractions, etc done. Plus that I had an informal discussion with a well known heart surgeon in California that echoed my surgeons first recommendation of tissue valve. Of course to further confuse me he said the CE Magna was "Old" technology and that he uses only the Medtronic Mosaic valve. He also said the surgical techniques will be vastly improved 15 years down the road.
To wind up an overly long post, I driving myself into an early heart attack (wait-that's not funny) trying to go over every option plus read the future. I will sit back for a moment and go over your thoughts on the matter. I have found in the past that you can get lots of mis-information from the professionals while the real story can only come folks who have been through it themselves.Thanks in advance for your counsel.
