[Treatment of anterior mitral valve prolapse by partial transposition of the posterior leaflet. Apropos of 7 cases].

Seven patients aged 8 to 62 years with massive mitral regurgitation due to anterior leaflet prolapse related to rupture or elongation of the chordae tendinae underwent reconstructive mitral valvuloplasty between June 1984 and September 1985, consisting in transposition of a bandlet of the posterior leaflet and its chordae to the free edge of the anterior leaflet. Medium term results with 2 to 16 months follow-up (average 8 months) showed all patients to have returned to Class I of the NYHA Classification; 5 patients had no systolic murmur, a mild systolic murmur 1 and 2/6 was present in 2 cases. The quality of the repair was confirmed by pulsed Doppler examination in all patients and by catheterisation and angiography in 3 cases. This surgical technique offers a good solution to the problem of mitral regurgitation due to severe prolapse of the anterior leaflet caused by rupture or elongation of the chordae tendinae.