Editorial to: Baseline MDCT findings after prosthetic heart valve implantation provide important complementary information to echocardiography for follow-up purposes by Suchá et al.

Abstract

Over the last years a growing number of prosthetic heart valve (PHV) implantation procedures have been performed in sequence with the aging of the population and improving surgical techniques. Currently, echocardiography is the most important tool in the follow-up and evaluation of complications associated with the PHV (pannus, thrombus, endocarditis). However, echocardiographic examination of PHV associated disease may be hampered by poor acoustic window or scatter artefacts caused by the PHV. PHV related disease such as endocarditis is related with a poor prognosis, especially when complications such as periannular abcess formation occurs. Early treatment of PHV associated disease improves prognosis. Therefore, an unmet clinical need for early detection of complications exists. In the evaluation of PHV (dys)function, multidetector-row computed tomography (MDCT) has shown to be of additive value. A necessity for MDCT to be implemented in daily practice is to be able to distinguish between normal and pathological features. Key Points • Early detection of PHV related complications improves prognosis • MDCT has additive value to echocardiography in the evaluation of PHV • RCTs for MDCT evaluation of PHV are required for clinical implementation.