Aortic Stenosis: Symptoms and Why Untreated Cases Are So Dangerous

SAVR is a very well-established technique for the last 50-plus years, and given a choice in terms of safety it should be the default choice in my opinion. Although I do TAVI quite a lot, I would still prefer a technique that is well proven and very well established — especially if the valve happens to be a bicuspid valve, a small annulus, or the patient is not very elderly. If my surgeon says the surgical risk is very high, then I chip in and accept those patients for TAVI. Though in recent trials TAVI has been established as non-inferior even for intermediate to low-risk populations, the decision should still be individualised on the merit of the patient.

As far as cardiology goes, the basic screening tools would be a thorough echocardiography and ECG, blood tests like lipid profiles, CRP values, and HbA1c for underlying diabetes mellitus, and sometimes even a stress test to dig out coronary artery disease. These are classical tests conducted in most people who have passed the age of 40 or 45, and especially the elderly — a thorough echocardiography usually digs out the necessary information, and then we start acting on the preventive aspect.

They should be in touch with us and send their CVs. They should be ready to face a physical interview, maybe online or coming here, and then we appraise them that they're fit to be inducted into our program. There are some local country regulatory bodies that clear their CVs — that part is also done by BLK. There are minimal fees involved, and they have to make their local arrangements for stay, food and clothing — and people have really been benefited by being with us in our lab, and we give them hands-on experience at some stage.

It's difficult to comment on this. It could be a vascular lump or some kind of arteriovenous fistula in the palm, but one has to do a thorough CT scan, a contrast CT, or maybe a DSA, and then only one can find out as to what is the reason — and can also fix it by minimally invasive technique, putting in a covered stent or coils accordingly. But one has to first prove what we're dealing with; I can't say on this bare information.

In India, open heart surgeries are cheaper than the West because the logistics of hospital management, bed and other things lasting six to seven days don't cost as much. Surgery is definitely cheaper here, and given that a lot of innovation goes into preparing minimally invasive procedures, those are at a slightly higher cost, or at least at par with the surgical technique. TAVI in India compared to the surgical procedure is about double the cost — in the West it could even be less than the surgical procedure, because their overheads and surgical procedures are much more expensive. In India we could offer this TAVI procedure for as little as $25,000, which could be perhaps the least in the world.

The risk rises sharply with age: patients past 70 have close to a 4 percent chance per year of developing aortic stenosis, and patients in their eighties face around a 10 percent annual risk.

The classical symptoms are chest pain or angina, blackouts or syncope, fatigue, and breathlessness, though the condition can remain silent until these symptoms or an echocardiogram reveal it.

Once a patient develops angina, syncope, or heart failure symptoms such as breathlessness, the chances of dying within two to four years are very high, and almost all untreated patients die within five years.

No. Medicine alone is not a treatment for aortic stenosis, and intervention through surgery or TAVI is needed once symptoms or echocardiogram criteria indicate it is time to act.