- Because we walk around, stand
and to various activities standing during our regular daily lives.
Gravity always tend to pull the blood to the lower extremity
and the only reason why blood continues
to go up to the heart against gravity is because of the valves in the veins
and the valves in the veins promote the blood to go
from the legs back to the heart.
Valves are very important to maintain lower
pressure in the system and allow one directional flow.
But if they failed there's a two directional flow,
which is abnormal flow back towards what came from.
Chronic Venous Insufficiency is a very common condition.
It affects a third of the adults in the United States.
There's a variety of problems that can affect the venous system, that can cause Chronic Venous Insufficiency.
Valve problems are one group of the physiological processes that affect patients with venous insufficiency,
and we have a variety of treatment to treat superficial venous reflux,
which is abnormal valves in the superficial veins.
But so far we have not had any surgical treatment for deep valvular reflux.
These patients have high blood pressure in their venous system,
and so that can lead to skin problems, even ulcers
and the worst case, they can have severe infections in these ulcers.
They have constant pain in the leg, which is very uncomfortable,
oftentimes to the point then they actually have to quit their jobs and become disabled.
The SAVVE Trial, SAVVE is an acronym for Surgical Antireflux Venous Valve Endoprosthesis
SAVVE basically brings a totally novel treatment to deep valvular disease.
It allows us to implant a bioprosthesis.
It's a metal frame that contains
a surgically sutured, porcine cardiac valve on it,
and basically it helps the blood flow to go back up when it's implanted in this position
and when the blood tries to go down back to the legs
because of gravity, that valve opens up and halts it.
And with this happening, there's less blood reflux
back to the legs and staying in the legs.
The procedure is relatively simple.
It does involve an incision in the middle of the thigh where we expose the femoral vein
and then the valve is surgically implanted into the vein.
By that I mean that there's a small incision made in the vein.
The valve is implanted and then sutured in place and then the incision is closed
and the patient recovers for probably about 1 to 2 days,
hopefully one day in the hospital before going home.
Gravity is really your enemy in that disease.
The SAVVE Trial brings in totally new and a game changer
for patients with deep venous incompetence and valvular problems.
Our hope is that we can actually
get the patient almost to a cure
so that they no longer have to contend with the high venous pressure
as you see in chronic venous insufficiency.
If you have wounds in the leg, you have swelling, physical for evaluation,
you may be a candidate and it
really will improve the quality of life.
We're able to help you as a patient to fight the gravity
and get your blood going back to the heart as it should normally go.