Abstract
BACKGROUND: Data on the impact of valve position on clinical outcomes in patients with atrial fibrillation (AF) and bioprosthetic valves (BPVs) are limited. METHODS AND RESULTS: The BPV-AF Registry was a multicenter, prospective, observational study involving 894 patients with BPVs and AF. In this post-hoc substudy, patients were classified according to BPV position: aortic (n=588; 65.8%), mitral (n=195; 21.8%), or both (n=111; 12.4%). The primary outcome was a composite of stroke/systemic embolism, major bleeding, heart failure requiring hospitalization, all-cause death, or BPV reoperation. During a mean follow up of 15.3±4.0 months, the primary outcome occurred in 90 (15.3%) patients (12.7/100 patient-years) in the aortic group, 25 (12.8%; 10.2/100 patient-years) in the mitral group, and 16 (14.4%; 11.8/100 patient-years) in the both-valves group (log-rank P=0.621). The unadjusted and adjusted risks were not significant for the mitral and both-valves groups relative to the aortic group (unadjusted hazard ratio [95% confidence interval] 0.80 [0.52-1.25] and 0.92 [0.54-1.57]; adjusted hazard ratio 0.89 [0.51-1.54] and 1.10 [0.58-2.09], respectively). There was no significant difference in the incidence of stroke/systemic embolism or major bleeding among the 3 groups (log-rank P=0.651 and 0.156, respectively). CONCLUSIONS: In patients with BPVs and AF, the risk for the composite outcome was comparable regardless of the BPV position.