ABSTRACT
RESHAPING THE TREATMENT LANDSCAPE OF STRUCTURAL HEART DISEASE Treating structural heart disease (SHD) has been the driving force behind the development of what is nowadays known as open heart surgery. Since the first successful attempt of repairing a failing mitral valve by Eliott Cutler and Samuel Levine (1), performed at the former Peter Bent Brigham Hospital in Boston, on a 12-year-old girl using a valvulotome, several technical developments have allowed gaining safe access to the inner heart. The probably most important contribution to modern open heart surgery was John Gibbon’s heart-lung machine (2). Ever since, heart valve surgery is performed with the heart-lung machine.
