Transcatheter Aortic Valve Replacement (TAVR) is a well-proven procedure for aortic valve replacement in people who are considered as high risk patients for Open Heart Surgery. In this procedure, a new aortic valve is fixed without removing the old, damaged valve with the help of a specialised catheter through a process similar to stenting. A new artificial valve wedges into the place of the older aortic valve. A dedicated Heart Team consisting of Interventional Cardiologist, Cardiac Surgeon, Non-Invasive Cardiologist, Cardiac Radiologist and the Cardiac Anaesthesiologist, first conduct a comprehensive evaluation to determine whether this procedure is an appropriate treatment option for the patient or not. This includes Clinical Examination, Echocardiogram, CT scan and Cardiac Catheterization.

Somewhat similar to a stent placement in an artery, the TAVR approach delivers a fully collapsible replacement valve to the original valve site through a specialised tube-based delivery system (Catheter). It is done by a small puncture in the groin, entering through the Femoral Artery (large artery in the groin), and usually does not require any major cut. The valve is taken through the specialised delivery catheter at the site of the original valve and is deployed there. Once the new valve expands, it pushes the old valve leaflets out of the way and the tissue in the replacement valve takes over the job of regulating blood flow. The small puncture in the groin is finally sealed.
 

Aortic Stenosis is one of the most common and serious valve disease problems. In this, a heart valve situated at the gateway between the main pumping chamber of the heart (Left Ventricle) and the big blood vessel (Aorta), that supplies blood to the whole body, becomes thick, calcified and narrowed. The heart chamber has to work harder against the narrowed, diseased valve and ultimately starts failing. The treatment constitutes replacing the diseased aortic valve with a new valve. The common causes of this disease are old age, rheumatic infection or a structurally malformed valve present from birth, degenerating by the fourth or the fifth decade of life. They all result in calcification and scarring of the valve leading to restriction of the amount of blood flow. The treatment involves replacing the valve either by an Open Heart Surgery or through an approved non-surgical technique like Angioplasty called TAVR.