Percutaneous Mitral Valve Therapy: The Next Decade

After more than a decade, the field of transcatheter mitral valve therapy is still in its infancy, yet it is surprisingly crowded. The first percutaneous mitral valve company was founded in 1999, the same year that the first transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) company was founded, but while TAVI is now on the market in Europe and in the US, the leading transcatheter mitral valve therapy has only just completed clinical trials.

The past year witnessed two milestones in structural heart disease: the first US approval of a transcatheter aortic heart valve – the Sapien valve from Edwards Lifesciences Corp. – and the completion of the first ever randomized clinical trial for a percutaneous device for mitral valve disease, the MitraClip from Abbott Laboratories Inc.

These two events are heartening for a cardiovascular industry looking for structural heart disease to provide the next major growth opportunities, particularly because revenues from the largest existing cardiovascular markets are flat: drug-eluting stents have leveled off and cardiac rhythm management is in the doldrums. (See Also see "Cardiac Rhythm Management Market Faces Continued Challenges Ahead" - Medtech Insight, 1 August, 2011..) The giant strategics in cardiovascular disease need billion-dollar products to maintain growth, and they’re looking to transcatheter heart valve treatments to provide them. Transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) is already yielding almost $700 million in revenues in markets outside the US, where some 50,000 patients have undergone the procedure to date

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