‘Light’ heart interventions have doubled in 5 years. In fact, the pandemic has not stopped, but only slowed down, the increasing propensity to use TAVI, the technology that allows the implantation of a trans-catheter aortic valve in the case of very serious cardiovascular diseases such as degenerative aortic stenosis. That is, avoiding open-heart surgery.
In the last five years, the total number of interventions in Italy has almost doubled, from 4500 to 8200, albeit with a decrease in the first year of Covid. On the podium Lombardia (with 1674 interventions) followed by Veneto (859) and Campania (with 797). In 2020 alone there were 7592 interventions, more than half of which (about 52%) in the North, almost a third in the South (about 31%), the rest in the Center of the country. The figure is slightly down (-8.73%) compared to the previous year, probably due to the effect of the pandemic which has had a profound impact on the activity of all health facilities in the country. However, it remains the second highest in the last five years at a national level, confirming the constant upward trend of the TAVI procedure. The data were presented in Naples during the national conference “The TAVI in the low-risk patient”. The event, which takes place under the aegis of the Italian Society of Interventional Cardiology (GISE), was attended by leading experts in the sector. An opportunity to take stock of the current situation and draw the lines for the near future.
Net of the pandemic impact, explained Giovanni Esposito, president of GISE, “the activity data collected indicate an increase in the adoption of TAVI in Italy, which went from approximately 4,500 procedures in 2016 to 8,200 in 2019, and then decreased in 2020. In Campania alone, in 2019 and 2020, the annual rate was just under 800 procedures carried out. Data that confirm the upward trend “.
“In the second phase of Covid, the impact of the pandemic was less – added Emilio Di Lorenzo, Director of the Medical-Surgical Department of the Heart and Vessels at the S. Giuseppe Moscati Hospital in Avellino – especially for those pathologies for which technologies are available, such as TAVI, which allow minimally invasive interventions capable of avoiding the use of intensive care and minimizing hospital stays, offering an important side also in terms of economic sustainability “.
The latest guidelines have significantly expanded the group of patients who can benefit from this method, “with an indication to TAVI for over 75 years, without forgetting younger patients with contraindications to cardiac surgery”, concluded Paolo Golino, UOC Director Cardiology, Luigi Vanvitelli University of Campania.