TY - CHAP M1 - Book, Section TI - Surgical Treatment of Aortic Valve Endocarditis A1 - Pettersson, Gösta B. A1 - Hussain, Syed T. A2 - Cohn, Lawrence H. A2 - Adams, David H. PY - 2017 T2 - Cardiac Surgery in the Adult, 5e AB - The most common heart valve affected by infective endocarditis (IE) is the aortic valve. Fortunately, significant progress has been made in our understanding and management of aortic valve IE. Clinical manifestations include fever, heart murmur, splenomegaly, embolic events, and bacteremia or fungemia. Early diagnosis is extremely important because progression invariably leads to devastating complications, including acute heart failure, cerebral embolism, and death, if the infection is not treated with antibiotics, surgery, or both. Increasingly, IE has become a “surgical disease,” particularly for aortic valve IE, and during the last decade, more than half of all patients have been operated on during the active phase of the disease (early surgery).1 SN - PB - McGraw-Hill Education CY - New York, NY Y2 - 2024/03/29 UR - accesssurgery.mhmedical.com/content.aspx?aid=1144164663 ER -