Recovering from TAVR 31 January 23.

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art.mouton

art.mouton

Member
Joined
Jan 25, 2023
Messages
7
Location
Louisiana
I am home recovering from TAVR at Baylor St Luke's Medical Center, Houston, Physician was with The Texas Heart Institute. All went well so far. A friend provided me with the link to this list and I am on, monitoring, for information as to after procedure results and activity. It was quite a surprise to be diagnosed with severe stenosis of my aortic valve. Seems to have left me no option other than to get it fixed. I am 77 year old male otherwise in fairly good health.
 
Still limited in motion (walking around the house mostly) but we don't have stairs a home. Will need to get back to the office and test it.
 
Welcome to the forum and welcome to the other side!

Please keep us posted on your recovery. It would be interesting to hear about your recovery with a TAVR valve, as most of us have had SAVR with OHS. It would be expected that your recovery would be much quicker than most of us.

Were you BAV, bicuspid aortic valve, or tricuspid?
 
Aortic valve. The heart cath showed I was almost totally clear, no blockage, no stents needed just the valve insertion. the side light to this was that my interventional cardiologist found the severe stenosis of the aortic valve in checking on the EVAR stent he had implanted a few years ago to repair my Aortic aneurysm.
 
art.mouton said:
Aortic valve. The heart cath showed I was almost totally clear, no blockage, no stents needed just the valve insertion. the side light to this was that my interventional cardiologist found the severe stenosis of the aortic valve in checking on the EVAR stent he had implanted a few years ago to repair my Aortic aneurysm.
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I don't think you understood my question. Probably most people here who have had aortic valve surgery had bicuspid aortic valves. A condition that people are generally born with and for whom about 80% end up needing valve replacement or repair. A bicuspid valve means that your aortic valve has only two leaflets, instead of three. Three leaflets is what a normal aortic valve would have. The bicuspid valve causes turbulance and increased velocity, which tends to cause the valve to calcify over time, leading to aortic stenosis and/or regurgitation. But, some people who have valves with 3 leaflets still end up needing surgery.
So, you may not know if your aortic valve was bicuspid or tricuspid. Totally fine if you don't know, but just curious.

If you were tricuspid (three leaflets), I would suggest getting your Lp(a) tested. This is a lipoprotein which is associated with high levels of aortic stenosis. It turns out that many people who are tricuspid and end up developing aortic stenosis have elevated Lp(a), but most cardiologists will overlook this. On the other hand, as we age, even people with normal valves tend to develop some calcification on their valves. So, you may or may not have high Lp(a). Your valve may have just developed it from you being 77, although 77 is a little on the young side for someone who is healthy with 3 aortic leaflets. Most people who have 3 leaflets never end up needing valve surgery, so it would be of interest to know if something like Lp(a) is involved. It could actually be important to know as well, as high levels might accelerate tissue prosthetic valve deterioration.
 
Chuck - Upon reading your response I realized I needed to learn the nomenclature better. MY prior heart cath indicated a tri-cuspid valve. It gave an "Agatston" score but I was unable to find that anywhere to compare to mine. I will discuss the Pp(a) with my cardiologist on my next appointment to review the valve. I am recovering well from the procedure with no leakage on the entry points.
 
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art.mouton said:
Pp(a) with my cardiologist on my next appointment to review the valve.
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Excellent. It is Lp(a). Or "Lipoprotein little (a)"

Here are some links with info, which you might want to read up on before your visit.

https://heart.bmj.com/content/107/17/1422
https://www.atherosclerosis-journal.com/article/S0021-9150(21)01468-4/fulltext
In that you had a tricuspid aortic valve, there is a significant possibility that your valve calcification was driven by high Lp(a). Either way, it is something that all should get tested at least once in their life.
 
I, also, suspect that it was caused by my long term use of Celebrex. I have reviewed the history and have seen some recent studies that show some correlation but not sufficient to prove direct causation.
 
art.mouton said:
I am home recovering from TAVR at Baylor St Luke's Medical Center, Houston, Physician was with The Texas Heart Institute. All went well so far. A friend provided me with the link to this list and I am on, monitoring, for information as to after procedure results and activity. It was quite a surprise to be diagnosed with severe stenosis of my aortic valve. Seems to have left me no option other than to get it fixed. I am 77 year old male otherwise in fairly good health.
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It's good you found out before before it's emergency surgery. Here's hope for continuing healing.
 
Welcome to the 70+ AVR surgery club. 😁 It seems that many or even most who post here see the surgeon sooner in life.

I too would like to hear more about the TAVR. How long was the surgery? What type and size valve was used? Etc.
 
Got to the hospital about 0530, brought to the back about 0730.
Into surgery about 0900 or so and out about 10:30. Recovery was delayed because of some bleeding from the main entry point but that was resolved. The valve is a Medtronics 34 mm EVOLUT FX. Recovery after return to the room was somewhat difficult as I was required to lay on my back from then until the next morning with restricted use of my legs and head position to prevent bleeding which was very hard on my back, hip and knees. But was released the next day. Wounds have fully healed in the week since the procedure.
 
art.mouton said:
Got to the hospital about 0530, brought to the back about 0730.
Into surgery about 0900 or so and out about 10:30. Recovery was delayed because of some bleeding from the main entry point but that was resolved. The valve is a Medtronics 34 mm EVOLUT FX. Recovery after return to the room was somewhat difficult as I was required to lay on my back from then until the next morning with restricted use of my legs and head position to prevent bleeding which was very hard on my back, hip and knees. But was released the next day. Wounds have fully healed in the week since the procedure.
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And you got a free repair of the backup battery in your extremely old Yaesu dual band radio for free (well a poboy, but shhhh we don't talk about that on these forums!!). Glad you found the site and glad you're doing well. Now if only we could hear the 3Y0J. :)
 
My antenna came down years ago. You guys got me thinking of putting something back up. I’ve got Kenwoods, Yaesus, and Icoms in the closet. Time to blow the dust off.
I think we’ve drifted off topic a bit…
 
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jeffp said:
My antenna came down years ago. You guys got me thinking of putting something back up. I’ve got Kenwoods, Yaesus, and Icoms in the closet. Time to blow the dust off.
I think we’ve drifted off topic a bit…
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Scientific discussion on the effects of near field, high powered RF 🎙️📡 on valve replacements! I'm a Medtronic clicker with a Flex 6500 and a Kenwood TS890s. :D

And yes, you should be back in it. FWIW, the solar flux is hanging around 215, it is literally 10m, 10watts and a wet noodle time. The bands are OPEN.
 
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