BATISTA TECHNIQUE FOR ELDERLY?

  My 82-year-old father has dilated cardiomyopathy as a result of a virus 2 years ago.  He has CHF, with a-fib and v-tac.  He just had a defibulator/pacemaker implanted.  His aortic valve has significant stenosis, but his 2 cardiologists say his heart is too weak for a valve replacement, and that's not the cause of his failing heart anyway.  They want to maintain him on dobutamine infusions.  He'd rather chance a surgical procedure if he could get a better quality of life.  Would he be a candidate for the ventriculectomy?

[CCF CARDIO MD APS]

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Dear PIA,
I believe a second opinion is in order and for two reasons:
1) Sometimes the surgery is very high risk for the patient and the surgeons who evaluated their condition do not operate on such cases.
2) There is a small chance that on evaluation here at the Cleveland Clinic that a surgeon might be willing to do a surgical procedure, most likely fix the stenosis, and not the Batista which is designed for cardiomyopathy only patients)
In short, a second opinion from a very experienced center (Cleveland Clinic does over 5,000 open heart surgeries a year, at least 40% include valve surgery and many are on patients that are older and have concommittant illnesses like your grandfather) is your next step.  If a place like the Cleveland Clinic says there is nothing surgically that can be done, then at least you will know that there really is nothing else available except medical therapy.
I hope this information is useful. Information provided in the heart forum is for
general purposes only.  Only your physician can provided specific diagnoses and therapies.
Feel free to write back with further questions. Good luck!
If you would like to make an appointment at the Cleveland Clinic Heart Center, please
call 1-800-CCF-CARE or inquire online by using the Heart Center website at
www.ccf.org/heartcenter. The Heart Center website contains a directory of the
cardiology staff that can be used to select the physician best suited to address your cardiac problem. Some of the valve cardiolgists who work closely with the surgeons are Dr.Griffin, Dr.Stewart, Dr.Mayer-Sabik, and Dr.Isada.