Does mitral valve repair improve survival compared to mitral valve replacement in octogenarians with degenerative mitral disease?
Mitral valve repair offers a survival benefit over replacement in octogenarians with degenerative mitral disease, though this benefit is questionable for non-degenerative disease.
Elective mitral repair can be performed with low operative mortality and good long-term outcomes in selected octogenarians with degenerative mitral disease, and is associated with better long-term survival than mitral replacement. The survival benefit associated with surgery for non-degenerative disease is more questionable.
Chikwe et al. (2010) studied this question.