BIOMEDICAL FLUID MECHANICS

Mitral-valve plasty

In the sixteen Dutch cardiothoracic centers, 2000 patients with mitral valve insufficiency are treated yearly with 'mitral valve plasty' (MVP): the application of a flexible metal ring. MVP has a lower mortality risk and a larger long-term survival rate than valve replacement. A major problem, however, is the determination of the ring size, which leads to difficult decisions during operations and contributes to more than 25% non-successful treatments.

We propose an innovative solution by combining clinical and technical expertise with modern information technology, resulting in an efficient and accurate pre- or inter-operative ring size determination based on 3D echocardiography.