Horace's Profile

I had open heart surgery to replace my mitral and aortic valves with pCorcine valves and to place an annulus ring on my tricuspid valve, all in April 2006. The root cause of my condition is having had a three year bout with rheumatic fever at age six. My tissue valves are now 17 years old and I am experiencing shortness of breath/ heart failure at an increasing rate. I underwent right and left angiograms on March 26 and found my coronary arteries are clear of plaque. At 88+ this was good news. Plan at this point, yet not detailed until surgeon and doctors get together, is to repair the mitral valve via minimally invasive means, probably within the next 30 days. My cardiologist is Dr. Raymond Stainback of Baylor College of Medicine Fannin Tower Group and Texas Heart Institute. His colleague, Dr. Neil Strickman did the angiogram procedure on 26th. Dr.Stainback me over to Dr. Dhaval Parekh and Dr. Kenneth Liao of the Texas Heart Institute at St. Luke's Hospital, Houston, Texas for evaluation and possible robotic or transcatheter surgery to repair/replace my severely leaking mitral valve. My aortic valve has a slight leak as does my tricuspid. Neither was as severe as my mitral regurgitation which was down to 37 per cent and not well directed. My original valve replacement surgery was done at North Colorado Medical Center Hospital in Greeley, Colorado, by Dr. Gene Tullis, placing porcine valves for the mitral and aortic and installing an annulus ring on my tricuspid. Mycardiologist at the time was Dr. Randall Marsh of North Colorado Cardiology. I am on my third pacemaker, having had the first implanted in 1999, the second in 2009 and the third one in 2018. I am looking forward to the repair of my mitral valve. Any advise would be appreciated. UPDATE: On April 23, Dr. Parekh and Dr. Liao and Dr. Stainback performed the transcatheter/robotic surgery and placed an Edwards Sapien valve into my mitral valve. The procedure went very well and I was in and out of the hospital in about 36 hours. Recooperating at home and will have my post op appointment on Monday, May 6. I can't say enough about the team of Drs. Parekh and Liao of the Texas Heart Institute and the job they did on and for me. I do feel as though I will be in better health to extend my already 88 years! Thanks to the team.