Minimally invasive aortic valve replacement with a catheter-based cerebral protection system: Transferring percutaneous technologies into a surgical intervention

Patients with severe aortic valve stenosis are currently treated with 2 different interventional techniques: surgical aortic valve replacement or transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI). Both have strengths and limitations. On the one hand, TAVI represents a valuable option in high- and intermediate-risk patients and is commonly preferred over surgical aortic valve replacement in subjects with porcelain or severely calcified aorta, on the other, the lack of data on valve durability raises concerns on its use in young, low-risk patients. We present herein the case of a low-risk 71-year-old patient with a severely calcified ascending aorta. We successfully combined our minimally invasive surgical approach with the use of a percutaneous cerebral protection system commonly employed during TAVI procedures. We believe that cardiac surgeons could adopt transcatheter technology to improve operative results.