Curriculum · Cardiovascular and Hypertension
Mitral valve prolapse
What it is
Mitral valve prolapse also goes by the names click-murmur syndrome, Barlow syndrome and floppy mitral valve. The most common cause of mitral regurgitation is LV dilation from CAD or HTN, and mitral valve prolapse stands among the other causes, on the chronic side and not the acute.
Causes and risk
Mitral valve prolapse is one of the chronic causes of mitral regurgitation, in a list that also holds rheumatic heart disease, papillary muscle dysfunction, endocarditis, calcification of the mitral valve annulus, accompanying hypertrophic obstructive cardiomyopathy, congenital endocardial cushion defect, corrected transposition, endocardial fibroelastosis and severe left ventricular dilatation. The acute causes are a separate list, and they are rupture of the chordae tendineae, which permits prolapse of a portion of a mitral valve leaflet into the left atrium, papillary muscle rupture, endocarditis that may lead to valvular destruction, and trauma. It has a firm link with Marfan syndrome. Marfan syndrome is associated with arachnodactyly, an arm span greater than height, a high arched palate, kyphosis, lenticular dislocation, mitral valve prolapse, myopia, and pectus excavatum. With aortic root dilatation, mitral valve prolapse is the most common cardiac defect in Marfan syndrome. Marfan syndrome is autosomal dominant, FBN1 gene.