Rakesh Suri

Mayo Clinic study examines costs following operating room and recovery improvement efforts ROCHESTER, Minn. —  Sept. 30, 2013  — The total hospital cost of mitral valve repair surgery — from the time a patient is admitted to the hospital until release — is similar, whether performed through small port incisions using robotic equipment or via the conventional open-chest method, a Mayo Clinic study of 370 patients found. Importantly, robotic surgeries were just as safe as conventional open procedures, but patients who underwent robotic mitral valve repair recovered more rapidly and returned home earlier than patients who had open-chest surgery, the study found. The results of the study also reflect systems innovation efforts designed to reduce the cost of high-technology cardiac care. The findings will be published online Oct. 1 in Mayo Clinic Proceedings. MULTIMEDIA ALERT: Video of Dr. Rakesh Suri will be available for download on the Mayo Clinic News Network. "These results reflect an important opportunity to decrease cost and improve quality of U.S. health care when technologically complex procedures are performed by well-trained, high-volume teams capable of leveraging the potential of less invasive approaches for patient benefit," says lead author Rakesh Suri, M.D., D.Phil., a cardiovascular surgeon at Mayo Clinic in Rochester.

ROCHESTER, Minn. — Aug. 8, 2013 — Patients with severe mitral valve regurgitation who are otherwise healthy should have mitral valve repair surgery sooner rather than later, even if they feel no symptoms, a Mayo Clinic-led study by U.S. and European researchers found. The results challenge the long-held belief that it is safer to "watch and wait" until a patient has symptoms, such as shortness of breath. This is the largest study to show that patients who undergo surgery early after diagnosis have improved long-term survival and lower risk of heart failure. MULTIMEDIA ALERT: Video of Drs. Rakesh Suri and Maurice Enriquez-Sarano will be available for download on the Mayo Clinic News Network.