There are many advantages to performing a valve repair operation. Frequent testing and monitoring of anticoagulant dosage is an absolute necessity and is inconvenient to the patient. Other advantages of valve repair are a suggestion of lesser complications and longer survival after surgery. The actual risk differs from one patient to the other, but most operated patients will develop a second stenosis within 20 years of surgery. The third surgical option for mitral stenosis is to replace the native mitral valve with an artificial prosthesis.
Artificial heart valves come in many different patterns, but all carry significant disadvantages.
The ideal heart valve has not yet been discovered, but the present day prostheses are greatly superior to earlier models, and have much lesser risks than before. Considerable research is being made on further improving the design and structure of prosthetic valves. Mitral valve replacement is an open heart operation. Similar to open mitral valvotomy, the surgeon opens the left atrium of the arrested heart, excises the mitral valve which is usually severely diseased, scarred or calcified, and inserts an appropriately sized artificial valve in its place. Mitral valve replacement is usually reserved for severely diseased valves because of its greater morbidity.