ABSTRACT
Several clinical situations due to a diseased or malfunctioning prosthetic valve constitute clinical emergencies. These scenarios often arise suddenly, are life-threatening, and require immediate firm diagnosis for therapeutic decisions, which more often than not include valve surgery. Besides the clinical evaluation, echo has a dominant role in the work-up of these patients. Valve prosthesis-related emergencies may be due to prosthetic obstruction of varying degree and acuity, prosthetic regurgitation of varying degree and acuity, infective endocarditis, embolism, or a combination of these.
