Postoperative morbidity and mortality from aortic valve replacements in 25 cases in Senegal

The purpose is to study the short- and medium-term morbidity and mortality linked to the implantation of an aortic prosthesis during cardiac surgery. This is a longitudinal, retrospective and descriptive study which takes place over a period from January 2017 to March 2020 (38 months) at the level of the thoracic and cardiovascular surgery clinic of the university Hospital Center of Fann in Dakar. All patients who underwent aortic valve replacement during this period were included in the study. A number of the series was 25 patients with a sex ratio of 2.66. The average age of the patients was 29.5 years (8-51 years). In the patients’ history, 19 patients (76%) had a notion of recurrent angina. Exercise dyspnea was the most common functional symptomatology present in 24 patients (96%). In the series, there were 22 cases (88%) of aortic insufficiency of various grades (2 to 4) with 7 cases (28%) associated with mitral insufficiency. We had 3 cases (12%) of aortic stenosis. All patients received surgical management under cardiopulmonary bypass. The average duration of cardiopulmonary bypass was 132 minutes ± 41.21 (53-226 minutes). The average duration of aortic clamping was 101 minutes ± 31.87 (53-164 minutes). The surgical procedures consisted in replacing the aortic valve with a biological prosthesis in one patient (4%) and a mechanical prosthesis in 24 patients (96%). The average length of hospital stay in intensive care was 5 days ± 4.03 (2-20 days). The average length of hospital stay was 20.76 days ± 13.19 (9 to 64 days). The average duration of follow-up was 8.2 months ± 4.57 (1 week - 32 months). During the follow-up, only one patient (4%) had developed infectious endocarditis on prosthesis and only one patient (4%) had a complication related to anticoagulant therapy (antivitamin K) such as gingivorrhagia and melena. We had recorded a single case of death at 6 months, a late mortality of 4%. Aortic valve replacement surgery, by median sternotomy gives satisfactory short- and medium-term results with negligible morbidity and negligible operative mortality.