[Personal experience with 2,500 closed heart mitral commissurotomies].

Between 1953 and 1976 a total of 2527 mitral commissurotomies have been performed in the Clinic for Cardio-Vascular Surgery of the "Fundeni" Hospital. This group included cases with pure mitral stenosis (predominantly following rheumatic disease), but also cases of mitral stenosis associated with other cardiac lesions in which the major hemodynamic element was the mitral obstruction. Criteria are discussed for surgery, the preoperative preparation of the patient, incidents, accidents and complications, as well as technical difficulties of the digital and/or instrumental mitral commissurotomies on closed heart, either carried out for the first time in the respective patient, or as iterative intervention. Comparing the results in relation with the functional stage of the disease (62.5% of the patients were classified in the III-IV evolutive degree, according to the NIHA classification), pulmonary hypertension (61.6% of the patients had medium or severe pulmonary hypertension), associated lesions (present in 17% of the cases--mitral failure predominated, together with tricuspid or aortic failures), it is appreciated that the technique of mitral commissurotomy on closed heart is an useful therapeutic method (88.6% very good and good results, a global death rate of 3.9%) that can be applied in a large category of patients, although there is a trend toward open-heart surgery, with all medico-economical major implications.