You don’t have to feel short of breath when you walk to the bathroom. They’ll tell you the next morning, ‘I can breathe.’ That’s how much of a difference TAVR makes, and how quickly that difference is felt.
Mick Jagger Recovering After TAVR Procedure
Valve Replacement Option Also Helping Hundreds of Illinois Patients
Rock icon Mick Jagger reportedly had heart valve replacement surgery in New York this week, and multiple reports say the procedure was a success, and the Rolling Stones frontman is in great health.
On March 30th the Rolling Stones postponed the North American leg of their No Filter Tour, citing the 75 year-old Jagger’s need for medical treatment, but said he was expected to make a complete recovery.
That prognosis is familiar to many heart valve replacement patients across Illinois as well. Jagger underwent transcatheter aortic valve replacement, or TAVR, which is a minimally invasive option for patients who need a new heart valve.
OSF HealthCare offers TAVR at two of its facilities: in Peoria, Illinois at OSF Saint Francis Medical Center, and in Rockford, Illinois at OSF Saint Anthony Medical Center.
TAVR is a procedure for patients with severe aortic stenosis (narrowing of the aortic valve opening). The procedure uses a balloon expandable aortic heart valve – placing it into the body via a catheter-based delivery system. The valve is designed to replace a patient’s diseased aortic valve while the heart continues to beat – avoiding the need to stop the patient’s heart.
The OSF Cardiovascular Institute TAVR team in Peoria has been offering TAVR for six years now, and takes the procedure a step further, by using the Minimal Approach TAVR (MA-TAVR) method. For a patient it means a new heart valve without a surgical incision. Dr. Sudhir Mungee is an OSF HealthCare Cardiovascular Institute Interventional Cardiologist. He says the procedure continues to evolve.
“When we first started the procedure, it used to be patient in complete anesthesia, needing a breathing machine, maybe 20 people in the room," reflected Dr. Mungee. He continued, "Now it’s done minimally, meaning patient is actually breathing on their own, they’re not on a breathing machine. We give some light sedation so they don’t feel anything, it’s done under local anesthesia. There are no skin cuts on the body, we put sutures from outside in, and we are deploying the valve in a beating heart while the patient is talking to us.”
TAVR is approved by the FDA for high high-risk surgical candidates and for the past three years, has been approved for intermediate-risk heart valve patients as well. Physician have high hopes it will soon be available for all aortic stenosis patients.
“I think this is just the beginning, because after dealing with high risk and intermediate risk patients, with TAVR, the procedure for valve replacement, it’s going to be, likely to be accepted for low risk patients," said Dr. Mungee. “There are not a whole lot of challenges left before the low risk is approved, but of course it has to go through the proper evidence and FDA approval before we can have this for most of our population.”
The less invasive TAVR procedure also comes with a quick recovery time. Most patients will leave the hospital in an average of four days, and can resume all normal activities within 10 days of the procedure. In comparison, traditional open chest surgery patients need up to seven days of hospitalization and six weeks of rehabilitation.
To learn more about TAVR, or to see if you are a TAVR candidate, visit OSF HealthCare's TAVR information page here.