“If you look, there’s a trend for increased all-cause mortality in the TAVR versus SAVR group at 6 years. This could be related to the big difference in paravalvular leak. Do you think paravalvular leak could have a real impact on mortality?” asked Dr. Tamburino, professor of cardiology at the University of Catania, Italy.
Not in the NOTION study, where they looked for but didn’t find any such association, according to Dr. Sondergaard.
“If you look at the survival curves from the beginning out to 6 years, you’ll see that the lines cross each other several times, so this small difference right now could just be random. I don’t think we can say there’s a higher mortality rate with TAVR for the time being,” he added.
The NOTION trial was funded by the Danish Heart Foundation. Dr. Sondergaard reported receiving research grants from and/or serving as a consultant to Abbott, Boston Scientific, Edwards Lifesciences, Medtronic, and Symetis.