Transcatheter mitral valve repair/replacement for primary mitral regurgitation

This review outlines the first trial experience with transcatheter therapy for mitral regurgitation (MR), developed from the EVEREST II MitraClip trial in a trial population comprised predominantly of patients with degenerative mitral regurgitation (DMR). Subsequent experience with MitraClip and several other devices has been mostly in functional MR patients. At the same time, there has been ongoing experience with MitraClip in DMR, and a variety of other devices have been developed for catheter-based treatment of MR. Annuloplasty devices have been indicated for DMR, and the potential for transcatheter annuloplasty to be used, in conjunction with other catheter techniques, such as chordal replacement, as it is in standard mitral repair, is developing. Transcatheter mitral valve replacement will clearly have some role for MR of both functional and degenerative etiologies, when repair is not feasible or fails. This review will discuss the evidence base and future development of these mitral repair and replacement approaches for DMR.