Each day, thousands of people in the U.S. have heart surgery. There are many different types of heart surgery. Surgeries may be used to

• Repair or replace the valves that control blood flow through the heart's chambers
• Bypass or widen blocked or narrowed arteries to the heart
• Repair aneurysms , or bulges in the aorta, which can be deadly if they burst
• Implant devices to regulate heart rhythms
• Destroy small amounts of tissue that disturb electrical flow through the heart
• Make channels in the heart muscle to allow blood from a heart chamber directly into the heart muscle
• Boost the heart's pumping power with muscles taken from the back or abdomen
• Replace the damaged heart with a heart from a donor.

Overview

The most common type of heart surgery for adults is coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG). During CABG, surgeons use healthy arteries or veins taken from another part of the body to bypass (that is, go around) blocked arteries. CABG relieves chest pain and reduces the risk of heart attack.

Heart surgery also is done to:

• Repair or replace valves that control blood flow through the heart
• Repair abnormal or damaged structures in the heart
• Implant medical devices that regulate heart rhythms or blood flow
• Replace a damaged heart with a healthy heart from a donor (heart transplant)

Traditional heart surgery, often called "open heart surgery," is done by opening the chest wall to operate on the heart. Almost always, the chest is opened by cutting through a patient's breastbone. Once the heart is exposed, the patient is connected to a heart-lung bypass machine. The machine takes over the pumping action of the heart. This allows surgeons to operate on a still heart.

In recent years, new ways of doing heart surgery have been developed. One new way is called off-pump, or beating heart, surgery. It's like traditional open-heart surgery, but it doesn't use a heart-lung bypass machine.

Minimally invasive heart surgery uses smaller incisions (cuts) than traditional open-heart surgery. Some types of minimally invasive heart surgery use a heart-lung bypass machine and others don't.

These new methods may reduce risks and speed up recovery time. Studies are under way to compare these new types of heart surgery to traditional open-heart surgery. The results of these studies will help doctors decide the best procedure to use for each patient.

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EditText of this page (last edited February 12, 2008)