Comparison of morphology and morphometry of human pulmonary and porcine pulmonary heart valves

Abstract               Background: There is an increased interest in the diagnosis and treatment of human valvular heart diseases. When heart valve disease progresses to a point that treatment by medicines does not provide relief from patient symptoms, surgery to repair or replace becomes the best alternative. Aims and objective: To compare the morphology and morphometry of human pulmonary and porcine pulmonary heart valves Material and methods: Study conducted in Sri Ramachandra medical college and research institute, Chennai during the period of 2014-15.In the present total number of 20 porcine heart valves was compared with 20 human heart valves and their morphology and morphometry was analyzed and compared. Both the human hearts and porcine hearts were weighed and the heart weight ranging from 300 gm – 450 gm was only used in this study. Porcine heart was obtained from slaughter house immediately after the slaughter and the specimen was washed with normal saline and the heart was fixed in 10 % formal saline solution. The formalin fixed specimens of human heart were procured from the embalmed cadavers. The data was entered and they were statistically analyzed using SPSS software 20 version. Results: The circumference of the pulmonary valve in human was 68.06mm and that of the porcine was 52.94mm and the p value was significant (p value: 0.000). The attached margin of human and porcine pulmonary valve showed significant difference on both (0.000). The free margin of the pulmonary valve showed insignificant p value (0.152- 0.169).The effective height of human pulmonary valve scallop had significant difference with porcine pulmonary scallops (0.005) and it was more in human pulmonary valve than porcine valve. The height of the scallop was having insignificant difference (0.620- 0.795). Conclusion: The porcine valve can be used in replacement surgeries of the human heart valves by matching the morphometry and reducing the geometrical difference to their minimum by using any interventional radiology. The porcine heart valves show excellent features similar to the human heart valves and they can be used in replacement surgeries as good bioprostheses in place of mechanical prosthesis irrespective of their other biochemical and other properties

Key Word: pulmonary heart valves, human heart, porcine heart