A 42-year-old woman with antiphospholipid syndrome (APLS) secondary to systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) complicated with thrombocytopenic purpura was successfully treated by mitral valve replacement with a mechanical prosthesis and tricuspid valve annuloplasty for mitral valve stenosis and regurgitation due to Libman-Sacks endocarditis. Intraoperative hemorrhagic oozing due to thrombocytopenia was effectively managed with platelet transfusion. Negative microbial culture and pathological examination of the resected mitral valve demonstrated an atypical sterile verrucose lesion, the findings of which were typically characteristic of Libman-Sacks endocarditis in SLE. She was successfully discharged 31 days after the operation without any hemorrhagic or thromboembolic events. However, 100 days after surgery, she suffered from fatal cerebral infarction caused by poor Coumadin compliance. Regarding the prosthetic valve selection, it is reasonable to select the mechanical valve because 1) anticoagulation therapy is necessary for APLS, 2) the risk of the dialysis induction due to the lupus-induced renal failure leading to a high calcium turnover, which results in accelerated bioprosthetic valve calcification. In case of SLE with APLS, in which anticoagulation and antiplatelet therapy is required to prevent the thromboembolic event and thrombocytopenic purpura, after valve replacement, strict management of anticoagulation plays an essential role to prevent thromboembolic complication.

We report a case of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infectious endocarditis (IE) which was successfully treated with linezolid (LZD). The patient was a 44-year old woman. She was referred to our hospital because of fever of unknown origin. MRSA was detected from blood cultures and echocardiography revealed vegetation on the right coronary cusp of the aortic valve. She was diagnosed with MRSA endocarditis according to the Duke criteria, and was immediately give vancomycin (VCM) and isepamicin. Sixteen days after administration of VCM, she had a progressively increasing skin rash. It was considered a side effect of antibiotics and VCM was replaced with teicoplanin (TEIC). Eventually, LZD was given to her at 22 days after hospitalization because TEIC was not effective. LZD alleviated the fever and diminished the signs of vasculitis due to endocarditis within a week. LZD was continued for 4 weeks with cardiac failure medically controlled, and she underwent aortic valve replacement using a mechanical prosthetic valve. LZD was injected just before the operation and continued for 15 days postoperatively, followed by oral administration of levofloxacin. She was discharged 35 POD and no recurrence of the infection had been observed at 1 year after the surgery. LZD could be an alternative therapy for MRSA endocarditis, but further examinations are warranted to determine the most appropriate regimen.

A 79-year old man presented with hoarseness and we diagnosed an aortic arch aneurysm, 60 mm in diameter. The aortic arch was right-sided and traversed posterior to the esophagus and trachea, and the arch vessels were mirror-imaged. Total arch replacement was performed under hypothermic circulation arrest using selective cerebral perfusion through a median sternotomy. Three cervical vessels were reconstructed, a 24-mm Hemashield was passed anterior to the trachea and esophagus, and an additional right thoracotomy was not necessary. The patient was uneventfully discharged on the 26th postoperative day.

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between smoking and cardiopulmonary function, and the effect of smoking habit on exercise tolerance after discharge from the hospital, focusing on CPX test data of patients hospitalized for acute myocardial infarction, and on CPX test data at 6 months after discharge. A total of 123 male patients hospitalized for acute myocardial infarction between April 2014 and December 2020 were included. Laboratory and CPX data were compared between smokers and non-smokers. CPX data of smokers, ex-smokers and non-smokers were also compared in 24 patients who underwent CPX examination 6 months after discharge. HDL-C was significantly decreased (p < 0.05) and τON was significantly prolonged (p < 0.05) during hospitalization in smokers. τON was significantly shorter only in ex-smokers (p < 0.05) 6 months after discharge compared to during hospitalization. These results suggest that τON, which reflects the oxygen uptake kinetics of peripheral tissues, is shortened by smoking cessation.

A 52-year-old man had a history that included aortic valve replacement due to infectious endocarditis in 1987. Chest X-ray showed slight enlargement of the superior mediastinum in 1998, but the enlargement was very mild and there had not been any significant change since 1998. However, chest X-ray demonstrated an extremely protruding mass on the right side of the superior mediastinum in May 2004 and a pseudoaneurysm located in the ascending aorta was demonstrated by computed tomography. We considered this aneurysm had been caused by ascending aortic cannulation for blood return from cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB) during the previous surgery. On re-operation, CPB was established by femoro-femoral bypass and median sternotomy was performed. The pseudoaneurysm measured 60mm in diameter and there was a felt-pledget on top of the aneurysm. Under deep hypothermic cardiac arrest, we incised the aneurysm and closed the orifice of the pseudoaneurysm using a patch (Hemashield Woven Fabrics). On pathological examination, the wall of the pseudoaneurysm showed a structural loss of the blood vessel and the felt-pledget had been exposed to the inferior of the aneurysm breaking through the wall. We considered this a non-mycotic pseudoaneurysm because of this patient's clinical course, surgical and pathological findings. We encountered a pseudoaneurysm in the ascending aorta that was detected and treated surgically about 20 years after aortic valve replacement.

A 69-year-old woman with a medical history of mitral valve replacement for infective endocarditis 14 years previously was recently admitted after being given a diagnosis with multiple cerebral infarction along with headache and speech disturbance. After emergency admission, both transthoracic and transesophageal echocardiographies revealed multiple, extensive vegetation on the mitral prosthetic valve. Based on these findings, we diagnosed prosthetic valve endocarditis with cerebral septic embolization ; and immediate mitral valve re-replacement surgery was performed. During the operation, a complication occurred when the left ventricular posterior wall ruptured during withdrawal from the cardiopulmonary bypass after mitral valve re-replacement. After a second cross-clamp and resection of the mitral prosthetic valve, we repaired the myocardial laceration and repeated the mitral valve re-replacement. We selected the following two methods from different approaches to repair the left ventricular rupture : (a) exclusion of the myocardial laceration using a bovine pericardial patch (intracardiac approach) ; and (b) direct suturing of the bleeding epicardium (extracardiac approach).Seven days after the surgery, computed tomography (CT) revealed a pseudoaneurysm in the left ventricular posterior wall. Several follow-up examinations using CT and echocardiography revealed gradual enlargement of the pseudoaneurysm. At 112 days after previous surgery, we successfully repaired the pseudoaneurysm through left lateral thoracotomy using the femorofemoral bypass with hypothermia. In the final surgery, we closed the orifice of the pseudoaneurysm using bovine pericardium. This case highlighted that left thoracotomy using a femorofemoral bypass with hypothermia could be a useful approach to address a left ventricular posterior wall pseudoaneurysm.