1 mn Italians have heart valve problems

(ANSA) - Rome, November 30 - The Italian Society of Cardiology (ISC) on Monday announced the launch of its "One Valve One Life" program to improve care standards for those with heart valve problems and facilitate access to alternative therapies to open-heart surgery for high-risk patients, in a country that it said has more than one million people who suffer from heart valve problems.
    Of those patients, about 300,000 cannot undergo heart surgery because the risk of operating would be too high.
    "In many cases these patients could instead undergo new minimally invasive procedures that have been shown to be safe and generally well-tolerated even in patients with critical clinical conditions," said Francesco Romeo, ISC president.
    Valve illnesses represent a new cardiovascular "epidemic" in both economic and public health terms, affecting 12% of those over 75 years old.
    In Italy an estimated 28,000 heart surgery or therapy interventions are linked to heart valve problems each year with over 200,000 hospital stays, about four per every 1,000 residents.