Identification of High-Risk and Low-Risk Subgroups of Patients with Mitral-Valve Prolapse

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Abstract
Mitral-valve prolapse is a common cardiac valvular disorder with a wide range of severity and diverse clinical outcomes. The lack of a standard definition of mitral-valve prolapse may explain the variation in reported complication rates. To identify high-risk and low-risk subgroups, we retrospectively analyzed clinical and two-dimensional echocardiographic data from 456 patients with mitral-valve prolapse. Mitral-valve prolapse was defined on the basis of echocardiographic findings as systolic displacement into the left atrium of one or both leaflets beyond the plane of the mitral annulus in the parasternal long-axis view. Two groups of patients were compared: those with thickening of the mitral-valve leaflets and redundancy (designated the classic form; n = 319) and those without leaflet thickening (designated the nonclassic form; n = 137).