Usefulness of Doppler echocardiography guidance during balloon aortic valvuloplasty for the treatment of congenital aortic stenosis

Introduction Few data exist regarding the potential benefits of continuous echocardiographic guidance during balloon aortic valvuloplasty (BAV) for the treatment of congenital aortic stenosis (AS). The objectives of this study were 1) to prospectively evaluate, in a series of consecutive patients with severe AS, the efficacy of BAV guided by Doppler echocardiography (DE) in relieving AS while preventing the appearance of significant aortic regurgitation (AR), and 2) to compare the results obtained by BAV-DE with those obtained in a historical series of patients who underwent BAV without echocardiographic guidance (BAV guided by angiography, BAV-A). Methods From 1995 to 2006 a total of 36 consecutive patients with AS (median age 6 years, range, 1 day to 26 years) underwent BAV in our center, with systematic application of continuous DE guidance since 2003. BAV-DE consisted of measuring the aortic annulus, choosing balloon diameters and evaluating the results of each balloon dilation on the basis of DE. Results Seventeen patients underwent BAV-DE (transthoracic and transesophageal DE in 3 and 14 patients, respectively) with successful transaortic gradient relief in 88% of them. None of the patients complicated with moderate or severe AR. At 17 ± 13 months follow-up there had been 3 cardiac events (18%), all of them related to aortic restenosis. BAV-A was associated with longer fluoroscopic times (35 min vs 16 min, p = 0.005 after adjusting for age and weight differences between groups) and a higher degree of AR following BAV (≥ 2° increase in AR, 32% vs 0%, p = 0.045 after adjusting for age and weight). Angiographic measurements of the aortic annulus were higher than those obtained by DE (mean overestimation + 2.5 ± 1.8 mm, range 0 to + 6 mm, p < 0.0001). Conclusion BAV-DE provides successful gradient relief of severe AS with lower fluoroscopy time and a lower degree of AR compared to BAV-A. Overestimation of aortic annulus diameters by angiographic measurements might partially explain the high rate of significant AR associated with BAV in the absence of echocardiographic guidance.