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Prosthetic Heart Valve Types

Valvular heart disease is characterized by the failure of a particular valve of the heart. This serious condition can lead to health complications and death if not treated properly, and can be corrected through techniques ranging from simply administering medication to complete surgical valve replacement. Valve replacement is done by replacing one of the heart valves with one of many types of prosthetic valves: a mechanical piece of equipment or even a biological valve from the heart of an animal or donor.

  1. Caged Ball Valve

    • Caged ball valves are mechanical heart valves that use a silastic (silicone-plastic) ball inside of a metal cage to function as a ball valve. When blood pumps into the ball, it moves up in the cage to allow blood through and then settles back into the ring to close the valve. This type of mechanical valve lasts for years, but runs the risk of allowing blood clots to form, increasing the risk of clots moving to other parts of the body or blocking the heart. The American heart Association states in a 2009 article that caged ball prosthetic valves are no longer implanted and the thousands of patients with caged ball valves require regular examination.

    Tilting Disk Valve

    • The tilting disk valve, or monoleaflet valve, is a single ring affixed to the heart chamber that has a central disk that spins on a metal axis. Resembling a hood exhaust valve on a muscle car, this valve operates by allowing pressurized blood to flow through the heart in one direction and only rotates 60 to 80 degrees. This rotation opens two holes in the heart chamber that allow blood to flow through but, as with all mechanical heart valves, runs the risk of allowing blood clots to form. The general trade-off with mechanical valves is that the user must undergo anti-coagulation (blood clotting) treatments to keep the valve in safe working order.

    Bileaflet Valve

    • A bileaflet valve is simply a tilting disk valve with the disk bifurcated into semi-circles. These are attached by hinges and add an additional orifice to the valve for a total of three openings. When pressurized blood hits the valve, the two halves of the circle fold away from the valve ring and allow blood to flow into the three openings before the valve flaps close again. Mechanical valve failure in a bileaflet valve may still allow one of the two circle halves to function normally, possibly extending replacement time.

    Bioprosthetic Valve

    • A bioprosthetic valve is a heart valve taken from a pig, cow or human donor and transplanted into the recipient's heart. The benefits of using a biologically-based valve over a mechanical valve is the fact clotting is less likely to form, resulting in a life without constant anti-coagulation medication. However, the other side of the coin shows a functional prosthetic life of about 10 to 15 years (versus the 20 to 30 years of mechanical valve functionality.) Bioprosthetic heart valves can be stented or stentless (reinforced with a tube in the heart) and can be installed using keyhole surgery in patients at high risk for infection.

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