{"id":2037,"date":"2022-03-22T13:58:34","date_gmt":"2022-03-22T13:58:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/?page_id=2037"},"modified":"2023-09-27T13:12:48","modified_gmt":"2023-09-27T13:12:48","slug":"bacterial-endocarditis","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/bacterial-endocarditis\/","title":{"rendered":"Bacterial Endocarditis: What Should Heart Valve Patients Know?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>There are several causes of heart valve disease.\u00a0 Patients may be born with a congenital heart valve defect (e.g. bicuspid aortic valve).\u00a0 Patients may also experience degeneration of heart valve structures and leaflets after opening-and-closing billions of times throughout one&#8217;s life.<\/p>\n<p>Heart valves are also susceptible to life-threatening infections.\u00a0 Bacterial Endocarditis, for example, is a common infection within the mitral valve that can lead to symptoms and cardiac damage.<\/p>\n<p>To help you better understand the causes, the symptoms and the treatments of bacterial endocarditis, we interviewed <a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/surgeons\/dr-Duc+Thinh-Pham-Chicago-Illinois.php\">Dr. Duc Thinh Pham<\/a>, a leading cardiac surgeon at Northwestern Medicine in Chicago, Illinois. So you know, Dr. Pham has performed successful heart valve surgery on many patients in our community including Andre Walton, Geraldine Bentel and George Mahoney.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/VOIp7nZEtEA\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2>Key Learnings About Bacterial Endocarditis<\/h2>\n<p>Here are key learnings from our discussion with Dr. Duc Thinh Pham:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Heart valves play a critical role for the management of blood flow through the heart. Dr. Pham states, &#8220;The role of the valves is to control the flow of the blood through the heart. Blood is designed to go through the heart in one direction. And, one direction only. When the valves do not work&#8230; When they leak, for example&#8230; The blood starts to flow backwards. That\u2019s why patients develop symptoms and heart failure.&#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\/370_129_152.jpg\" alt=\"Dr. Duc Thinh Pham\" width=\"129\" height=\"152\" \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/surgeons\/dr-Duc+Thinh-Pham-Chicago-Illinois.php\">Dr. Duc Thinh Pham<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The term &#8220;heart failure&#8221; is a catch-all medical term used to describe the potential symptoms and problems that can result from poorly functioning heart valves.\u00a0 Such issues may include inefficient heart pumping, fluid retention, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/atrial-fibrillation\/\">atrial fibrillation<\/a>, and a diminished quality-of-life.<\/li>\n<li>Bacterial Endocarditis is an infection of the heart.\u00a0 The heart valves are the most commonly infected area of the heart. Infections may cause (i) the heart valve to leak and (ii) the structure of the heart to deteriorate.\u00a0 The mitral valve is commonly infected with Bacterial Endocarditis.<\/li>\n<li>The distinct cause of a Bacterial Endocarditis infection is often not known. Dr. Pham states, &#8220;For a lot of patients who develop bacterial endocarditis, we often don\u2019t really find a cause for the infection itself. There are a small percentage of patients who develop it from dental infections, trauma and skin trauma. Generally, those infections may be in patients who are immunocompromised. For most patients with a healthy heart, the chances of developing endocarditis is low.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>The initial treatment for Bacterial Endocarditis, given the severity of the infection, may be intravenous antibiotics that target the bacteria that is being cultured within the bloodstream.<\/li>\n<li>If Bacterial Endocarditis causes severe damage to the mitral valve, cardiac surgery may be needed.\u00a0 As the valve structure and valve leaflets may be severely compromised from Bacterial Endocarditis, patients typically need mitral valve replacement surgery.\u00a0 Dr. Pham states, &#8220;The larger percentage of patients who develop bacterial endocarditis, the damage to the valves is bad enough that I would say most, the majority, 80% or more end up needing a mitral valve replacement which may include a mechanical or tissue valve.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>Transcatheter mitral valve devices are not currently used for patients with Bacterial Endocarditis. According to Dr. Pham, &#8220;The first goal of the treatment is to remove the source of the infection and then replace the function of the valve. Unfortunately, most of the transcatheter devices don\u2019t take care of that first part of the treatment.&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>Most patients do very well after surgery for Bacterial Endocarditis with a return to a normal quality of life.<\/li>\n<li>When diagnosed with Bacterial Endocarditis, Dr. Pham recommends that patients seek care at a hospital or cardiac center that specializes in valvular disease and utilize a &#8220;heart team&#8221; approach for provided care for patients.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2>Many Thanks Dr. Pham &amp; Northwestern Medicine<\/h2>\n<p>On behalf of our patient community, many thanks to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/surgeons\/dr-Duc+Thinh-Pham-Chicago-Illinois.php\">Dr. Duc Thinh Pham<\/a> for taking the time to share his clinical experience and research with us.\u00a0 And, many thanks to\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/hospital\/northwestern-memorial-valve-program\">Northwestern Medicine<\/a>\u00a0for taking great care of the HeartValveSurgery.com patients.<\/p>\n<p>Related Links:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/endocarditis-facts\/\">Endocarditis: Top 7 Facts for Heart Valve Patients<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/2016\/02\/24\/patient-mind\/\">The Patient Mind: Before &amp; After Heart Surgery with Dr. Pham<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/emergency-aortic-aneurysm\/\">Emergency Aortic Valve &amp; Aneurysm Surgery<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/2019\/12\/16\/savr-tavr-dr-chris-malaisrie\/\">Which Operation Did Bicuspid Aortic Valve Patient, Jim, Get \u2013 TAVR or SAVR?<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\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. Pham 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":[2],"class_list":["post-2037","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","category-adams-updates"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2037","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=2037"}],"version-history":[{"count":20,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2037\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3793,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2037\/revisions\/3793"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2037"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2037"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}