New heart valve used on adult patient at HonorHealth in Scottsdale

A new type of heart valve replacement has successfully treated an adult. The procedure was completed in December at HonorHealth Scottsdale Shea Medical Center.

Dr. Tabitha Moe directs the HonorHealth Adult Congenital Heart Disease program. She explained that some babies are born with a defect (called tetralogy of Fallot) in which not enough blood gets from the right side of their heart to their lungs, so they have a surgery to open up that pathway.

“As these children age, they often require additional procedures because the size of the tube that’s put in place as a 1-month-old, may be too small when that child grows up,” Moe said.

That can lead to dysfunction and require a pulmonary valve replacement. Moe said many of those patients have already had open heart surgeries and this new treatment creates a less invasive option because it’s a catheter-based procedure.

“Catheter-based procedures can be done through the leg or through the vein in the groin or through the vein in the neck maybe, depending on where we’re trying to go,” Moe said.

Those procedures pose a lower risk to patients and they spend less time in the hospital. The new Medtronic Harmony Transcatheter Pulmonary Valve is self-expanding and specifically designed for patients who have really large connections between their right ventricle and pulmonary artery.

“The Harmony valve is actually individualized and designed for each patient with a really high-tech 3D virtual modeling software,” Moe said. “So the patients go through at CT scan, that CT scan goes to the engineers at the manufacturing company and they tell us which size valve they need to have.”

EDITOR'S NOTE: An earlier version of this article said that HonorHealth was the first to implant this type of valve. Phoenix Children’s Hospital actually implanted the valve for the first time in adults in Arizona. Phoenix Children’s completed the procedure twice in 2021.