{"id":1900,"date":"2022-02-15T23:28:25","date_gmt":"2022-02-15T23:28:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/?page_id=1900"},"modified":"2025-06-07T22:44:52","modified_gmt":"2025-06-07T22:44:52","slug":"exercise-athlete","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/exercise-athlete\/","title":{"rendered":"Exercise &#038; Heart Valve Disease: What Should Patients Know?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>When diagnosed with heart valve disease&#8230; Professional athletes, weekend warriors, and exercise enthusiasts are often confused about the &#8220;Dos and Don&#8217;ts&#8221; specific to their cardiac disorder and the sports\/activities they enjoy.<\/p>\n<p>To help patients better understand the potential risks and opportunities of exercise in the presence of heart valve defects, we interviewed Dr. Allan Stewart, who has performed over 5,000 cardiac operations and more than 2,000 heart valve repair and replacement procedures.\u00a0 So you know, Dr. Stewart is a triathlete and marathon runner who has trained alongside many of his heart surgery patients.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/w_yoJN8Ws1c\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2>Key Learnings About Exercise &amp; Heart Valve Disease<\/h2>\n<p>Here are several important learnings from our discussion with Dr. Stewart:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Dr. Stewart is an endurance athlete who trains and competes in marathons and triathlons with his patients. He states, &#8220;I\u2019ve operated on professional athletes that have gone back to playing professional football. I have done the New York City marathon with patients that have had aortic surgery. I encourage that. I run with them to show them that it\u2019s safe.&#8221;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/profileImages\/10_129_155.jpg\" alt=\"Dr. Allan Stewart\" width=\"129\" height=\"155\" \/>Dr. Allan Stewart<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Living a healthy and fit lifestyle does not prevent the onset and progression of heart valve disease which is a structural heart defect that will not get better by itself. As Dr. Stewart states, &#8220;Despite our commitment to exercise, heart valve disease can affect people who are physically fit. One can\u2019t reverse structural heart valve disease. It doesn\u2019t get better on its own.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>Key symptoms that exercise enthusiasts should carefully monitor include fatigue, shortness of breath, weight gain from fluid retention and loss of stamina.<\/li>\n<li>Identifying the right time for a heart valve repair or replacement operation is critical. In his practice, Dr. Stewart uses regular echocardiograms, performed at specific intervals, to determine the optimal time for an operation.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/Images\/dr-allan-stewart-triathlon.jpg\" alt=\"Dr. Allan Stewart and Patient, Greg O'Keeffe Finish The New York City Triathlon\" width=\"368\" height=\"269\" \/>Dr. Allan Stewart (Surgeon) with Greg O\u2019Keeffe (His Patient)<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Aortic stenosis is a fixed obstruction that prevents blood flow through the heart due to a narrowed valve that is often calcified. Exercise can actually make the patient feel worse and dehydrated. Lifting heavy weights, for example, can put more blood pressure against the aortic which is not recommended.<\/li>\n<li>Mitral valve disease is different for athletes compared to aortic stenosis. According to Dr. Stewart, &#8220;Mitral valve disease is quite different. Mitral valve disease, as long as your heart rhythm hasn\u2019t changed, meaning you haven\u2019t had atrial fibrillation, and you have mild to moderate leakage of your valve, you can exercise without much restriction, specifically aerobic exercise to get your heart rate up.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>Aortic root aneurysms are often associated with aortic valve disease and need to be carefully monitored in patients who exercise as the aorta can dissect or tear if not managed properly. Dr. Stewart states,\u00a0 &#8220;We can make those worse by heavy weight lifting and by massively increasing the pressure in the aortic root by deadlifts, squats, bench press, that can precipitate both the valve leaking more and the aortic dissecting or tearing.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>In his cardiac surgery practice, Dr. Stewart uses minimally-invasive techniques to help patients recover faster with less discomfort and pain.\u00a0 In particular, Dr. Stewart uses rigid sternal fixation (titanium plates) to accelerate healing.\u00a0 Dr. Stewart notes, &#8220;We do minimally invasive surgery, we use this little titanium plate. The breast bone is not open and minimizes pain and take less narcotics.&#8221;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/bit.ly\/36vCqTc\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-30656\" src=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/Images\/sternalock-blu-chest-plate-healing.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"314\" \/><\/a>Rigid Sternal Fixation (SternaLock Blu)<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Dr. Stewart believes that athletic patients may want to view heart surgery as a &#8220;reset button&#8221; specific to their health and cardiac condition. Dr. Stewart states, &#8220;Cardiac surgery, in my mind, is a reset button. It is a moment in time where we can correct a problem, whether that problem is acquired or that problem is genetic or congenital. It could be fixed. The goal is to fix it in a curative manner so that we can go back to living our best lives. A properly done valve operation, the person should be able to go back to exercise without restriction.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>Specific to advice for athletic patients, Dr. Stewart suggests, &#8220;Leading up to surgery, I would say pay attention to aerobic activity, to things like yoga and stretching and flexibility exercises, and then afterwards, have a plan in your mind that precedes surgery of what your goals are after surgery. Have your plan in place ahead of time.&#8221;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2>Many Thanks Dr. Stewart!<\/h2>\n<p>On behalf of our patient community, many thanks to Dr. Allan Stewart for taking the time to share his clinical research and experience with us.\u00a0 In addition, we would like to thank Dr. Stewart and the entire Mercy Heart Institute team for taking such great care of the patients from HeartValveSurgery.com.<\/p>\n<p>Keep on tickin!<br \/>\nAdam<\/p>\n<p>P.S. For the hearing impaired members of our community, I have provided a written transcript of my interview with Dr. Stewart below.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"cms.php","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"class_list":["post-1900","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","category-before-surgery"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1900","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1900"}],"version-history":[{"count":23,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1900\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5886,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1900\/revisions\/5886"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1900"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1900"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}