The effect of mitral valve replacement on atrial fibrillation behaviour
Background: Atrial fibrillation (AF) persisting after mitral valve surgery reduces survival due to heart failure and thrombo-embolisms and impairs quality of life. Restoration of the sinus rhythm might lead to a lower incidence of thrombo-embolism and valve-related complications in the postoperative period.Methods: This non-randomized prospective study was carried out between period April 2015 to December 2018 in the Department of Cardiothoracic and Vascular Surgery, Government General hospital, Guntur, Andhra Pradesh, India. A total of 80 patients underwent mitral valve replacement during the study period. 50 patients out of these were with atrial fibrillation and were part of this study, who underwent mitral valve replacement.Results: All fifty patients were in atrial fibrillation based on clinical examination and the echocardiogram. 13 patients preoperatively were in atrial fibrillation with fast ventricular rate. These patients were placed on antiarrhythmic drugs to control the ventricular rate prior to mitral valve replacement. After surgery twenty out of fifty (40%) patients reverted to NSR and maintained the same rhythm till the 6 months of follow-up. Twenty-nine (58%) patients continued in atrial fibrillation after surgery.Conclusions: The results of the present study showed that preoperative atrial rhythm strongly determines postoperative rhythm. In view of the promising results of combined mitral valve and anti-atrial fibrillation surgery, the inescapable conclusion is that the anti-arrhythmic procedure should be offered routinely to all patients with a history of preoperative AF.