Intracardiac echocardiography (ICE) has become an effective alternative to trans‐esophageal echocardiography (TEE) as a guidance during interventional procedures for structural heart diseases, allowing to proceed under conscious sedation. To guide percutaneous left atrial appendage (LAA) closure, the ICE probe is usually placed in the right atrium, in the pulmonary artery or in the left atrium (LA); however, the views from the right atrium or the pulmonary artery are often suboptimal, debarring a complete visualization of the LAA and the surrounding structures, whereas the LA location requires trans‐septal puncture, may provoke LA wall mechanical stimulation and is often associated with unstable position of the ICE probe. In our case, after a second trans‐septal puncture, the ICE probe was placed in the upper left pulmonary vein; this was safely performed and provided an optimal imaging of the LAA, comparable to that obtained by TEE, thus warranting an adequate guide during all procedural steps.
In Marfan patients, the Bentall procedure is associated with excellent mid-term outcome. The reimplantation technique, adopted for less dilated aortas, provides similarly satisfactory results. The Valsalva graft seems, with time, to allow a stable aortic valve function.
Antithrombotic treatment of frail patients with AF presents various challenges. The fear of bleeding often leds to a large underuse of anticoagulant agents in these patients, although more recent data indicate that oral anticoagulation (especially with the newer, direct anticoagulants) is increasingly used. While there is a need for more real world data, available evidence suggests that non-vitamin K antagonist oral anticoagulants (NOACs) are an effective alternative to warfarin in frail patients with AF for preventing thromboembolic events, with a better safety profile. Logical considerations and evidence-base data related to the reduced bleeding risk (also including major bleeding and intracranial bleeding) of NOACs make these drugs the anticoagulant agents of choice in frail patients; however, in this setting an individualised approach should be taken, taking into consideration the risk of thromboembolic and bleeding events, other comorbidities and patient-related factors, rather than a generalised "one drug fits all" approach.
Timing and type of aortic wall abnormalities (AWC) repair are still being debated. Automatically patient-specific 3D aortic arch geometrical model estimation from MRI images can provide a better knowledge of the geometry of the aortic arch anomaly and can be useful to evaluate preoperatively the best treatment. Therefore, we have developed a software to automatically compute a patient-specific 3D aortic arch geometrical model from CMR data and we have validated it.
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