LAUSR

Corresponding Author: Dr. Preeti Awari, Assistant professor, Department of Anatomy, Dr. .Y. Patil Medical College, Hospital and Research centre, Dr. D.Y. Patil Vidyapeeth, Pune, Maharashtra, India. Mobile no: 9075001993 E-Mail: [email protected]; [email protected] Background: The mitral valve apparatus, consisting of the mitral valve leaflets and commissures and subvalvular apparatuspapillary muscles and chordae tendinae; is one of the most complex and intricately designed structures present in the human body and therefore the understanding of anatomical variations of papillary muscles becomes important for surgical interventional procedures, in response to the increasing incidence of valvular heart defects. The aim of the cadaveric analysis was to identify the disparity in the morphometry of the papillary muscles of the mitral valve complex. Therefore this study was taken up with an effort to extend the concepts previously presented as well as to overcome deficiencies in the knowledge of gross architecture and positional nomenclature of the papillary muscles. Materials and methods: Fifty formalinized cadaveric hearts were the material for study. Papillary muscles of left ventricle were classified according to a system developed by Berdajs et al., (2005), by precisely measuring shapes lengths and widths. Results: The significant outcome of this study indicates that no two papillary muscles out of the 50 specimens had the same size, shape or position. All the hearts had two distinct groups of muscles – anterolateral and posteromedial. Specific analysis of each group revealed data regarding the muscles. In the antero-lateral group of the specimens, the maximum height and width of the muscles was 37.40mm and 17.06mm respectively and in the postero-lateral group, 33.86 and 26.90mm respectively. Conical shaped muscles were the most commonly found muscles owing to the minimum obstruction posed by them to blood flow. Implication: Better understanding of morphological variations can help cardiothoracic surgeons to customize surgical procedures according to the papillary muscle pattern of the individual patient.