Mitral Valve Center

Overview

Cleveland Clinic’s Mitral Valve Center provides an in depth evaluation of mitral valve problems including a quantitative assessment of the severity of the valve narrowing or leaking. Our experts will work with you to decide whether a surgical or interventional procedure is indicated and when is the best time for this to be performed. We offer a variety of treatment options for patients with mitral valve disease. Our team offers expertise and experience to provide an individual plan of care with the best outcomes possible.

Who we treat

We treat patients with all forms of mitral valve disease, including:

• Mitral regurgitation (leak)
• Mitral valve prolapse
• Mitral stenosis (narrowing)
• Mitral valve dysfunction with atrial fibrillation (afib)
• Complex mitral valve disease, including calcified valves and previously repaired or replaced valves

Treatment Options

Available treatments

We offer a wide range procedures to manage conditions involving the mitral valve, including:

• Mitral valve repair (We have a nearly 100% success rate for repair of leaky mitral valves)
• Minimally invasive and robotic operations
• Mitral valve surgery that is done at the same time as operations on other valves (tricuspid and aortic valves) or bypass surgery
• Mitral valve reoperations
• Catheter-based (nonsurgical) approaches, including Balloon Valvuloplasty, MitraClip and the latest transcatheter mitral valve techniques (TMVR) being studied in clinical trials

Medical Team

The Cleveland Clinic Valve Center offers a multi-disciplinary team of specialists in cardiology, interventional cardiology and cardiothoracic surgery, specialized imaging, pathology, imaging diagnostics and treatment.

• Brian Griffin, MD – Medical Director
• Marc Gillinov, MD – Surgical Director
• Amar Krishnaswamy, MD – Interventional Director

Multidisciplinary Team

Cardiovascular Surgery

• Marc Gillinov, MD,* Department Chairman, Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery
• Daniel Burns, MD*
• Kenneth McCurry, MD
• Per Wierup, MD, PhD*

All surgeons above perform minimally invasive approaches

*Performs robotically assisted mitral valve surgery

Cardiothoracic Anesthesia

• Andrej Alfirevic, MD

Cardiovascular Medicine

Diagnoses valve disease and cares for patients over time; sees patients for scheduled office visits, monitoring and medical management.

Section of Cardiovascular Imaging

• Chadi Ayoub, MD
• Patrick Collier, MD, PhD
• Paul Cremer, MD
• Milind Desai, MD
• Brian Griffin, MD, Head, Section of Cardiovascular Imaging
• Richard Grimm, DO
• Serge Harb, MD
• Wael Jaber, MD
• Christine Jellis, MD
• Vidyasagar Kalahasti, MD
• Allan Klein, MD
• Deborah Kwon, MD
• Venu Menon, MD
• Rhonda Miyasaka, MD
• Zoran Popovic, MD, PhD
• Leonardo Rodriguez, MD
• Maran Thamilarasan, MD
• Suma Thomas, MD
• Bo Xu, MD

Section of Clinical Cardiology

• Benico Barzilai, MD,
• Donald Hammer, MD
• Heba Wassif, MD, MPH

Cardiovascular Medicine – Interventional

Performs mitral transcatheter valve procedures.

• Samir Kapadia, MD, Head, Section of Invasive and Interventional Cardiology
• Amar Krishnaswamy, MD

Appointments

The Mitral Valve Center is located at Desks J1-5 and J4-1, in the Miller Family Heart, Vascular & Thoracic Institute.

Make an Appointment

Due to the nature of valve disease, your needs as a patient can guide your care. For example, you may want to have regular follow-up over a long period of time, or maybe you have just been diagnosed with valve disease and want to establish a care and treatment plan. Perhaps you are exploring treatment options and need a surgery consultation. No matter what your needs, we are here for you every step of the way. If you have any questions please do not hesitate to call.

Traveling to Cleveland Clinic

We want to make traveling to Cleveland Clinic as easy as possible. For information, please click here: Information on travel to the Miller Family Heart, Vascular & Thoracic Institute.

If you need more information, contact us, chat online with a nurse or call the Heart, Vascular Institute Resource Nurses at 216.445.9288 or toll-free at 866.289.6911. We would be happy to help you.

Clinical Team Appointments

To make an appointment, please call toll-free 800.659.7822 Cardiology Appointments or request an appointment online.

Our experts will meet with you and evaluate your condition with echocardiography, stress testing and when necessary more advanced imaging techniques such as cardiac catheterization and transesophageal echocardiography or MRI. We provide second opinion evaluations for those who have been told that a procedure is needed for their valve disease. We will discuss with you how bad your valve disease is, what the consequences for your future are and whether an intervention is needed now to improve your symptoms and/or live expectancy.

If your scheduled appointment is at least one week away, you will be asked to send in a copy of your medical records, including a medical history, test results and films (echocardiogram, ultrasound, chest X-ray, MRI, CT). All information should be sent in the same package (clearly marked with your name and address) via Airborne Express, Federal Express, or certified US mail (make sure you have a tracking number) to the physician you will be seeing at Cleveland Clinic. Your appointment may be with Cardiovascular Imaging (Desk J1-5) or Clinical Cardiology (Desk J2-4), depending on your condition and needs.

The address to mail your records is:

Physician Name
Cleveland Clinic
Desk #
9500 Euclid Avenue
Cleveland, OH 44195

If your scheduled appointment is less than one week away, please bring your records to your appointment.

What to expect during your appointment:

A cardiologist from the Mitral Valve Center will review your medical records and prior images and perform a physical exam and perform a physical exam.to enable us to determine change in your condition. We will likely want to perform our own echocardiography here and may request other testing if it will help determine the severity of your condition or the relationship of your mitral valve condition to symptoms and prognosis.

How long will you need to stay at Cleveland Clinic?

You should plan on spending 1 to 2 days in the Cleveland area. Your stay may be longer if a treatment is scheduled at the time of your visit.

Follow-up

Your doctor will talk to you about your plan for follow-up care.

Cardiovascular Surgery Team Appointments

If you would like information about surgical options for valve disease, you can send your medical records to us for a review. The process involves several steps:

• Contact the Heart, Vascular & Thoracic Institute Resource Nurses, who will collect information such as your contact information and the type of procedure you need.
• The nurses will give you a list of the information needed to complete the surgical review and tell you how to send in your information.
• You will send in your records to be reviewed by one of our surgeons.
• The surgeon’s office will call you to let you know about your treatment options. The process generally takes a couple weeks once we receive your films, unless your doctor determines that you need surgery right away.
• If you decide to have surgery at Cleveland Clinic, we will give you a surgery date. In some cases, you will see the surgeon for a consultation and surgery will be scheduled after the appointment.

What to expect during your appointment

You will need to arrive a few days before your surgery to have a full evaluation and meet your surgical team. You and your family will attend a program to learn what to expect before, during and after your surgery. See Heart Surgery at Cleveland Clinic for more information about having surgery at Cleveland Clinic.

How long will you need to stay at Cleveland Clinic?

Your hospital stay depends on many factors, such as your condition, the type of procedure you need and your medical history. Generally, patients who live outside of the Cleveland area come to Cleveland a day or two before surgery, stay in the hospital 5 to 7 days, and stay in Cleveland at least one night after they leave the hospital. We ask that you return to Cleveland Clinic for a visit during the first week after you leave the hospital (post-op visit), so you may want to plan on staying in the area until after that visit.

Follow-up

You will need to have follow-up visits for 6 months to a year after surgery. Your doctor will let you know how often you need to be seen. You may also be able to follow-up by telephone. You will need to have an echocardiogram once a year after your surgery to make sure your valve is working properly.

Videos

View more Mitral Valve videos including those that show actual valve surgery.

Video Playlist

1. Valve Repair for Mitral Regurgitation, Dr. Marc Gillinov.
2. Indications for Valve Surgery, Dr. Kenneth McCurry.
3. Complex Surgeries for Mitral Valve Disease, Dr. Jose Navia.