The Alarm Blares for Undertreatment of Aortic Stenosis

Brian LindmanAssociate Professor of Medicine, Vanderbilt University

“Despite having a recommendation to have valve replacement, many studies have shown that upward of 50% of patients who have severe symptomatic aortic stenosis are not getting treated with aortic valve replacement in a timely manner. This has a huge impact on survival, and this is a big problem.”

“There's high morbidity and mortality when patients with severe aortic stenosis are not treated. Despite the rapid evolution of aortic stenosis care with the introduction of TAVR, and also improvements in surgical AVR, nearly half of patients still do not get treated for severe symptomatic aortic stenosis.”

“In a homogeneous, affluent, predominantly white population, our detection and treatment of aortic stenosis is abysmal. That's what this study says to me. If you were to replicate this in a more heterogeneous population with marginalized populations, I would imagine it would be significantly worse.”