MitraGen is a privately held cardiovascular device company developing minimally invasive or Transcatheter Mitral Valve Repair (TMVR) technologies for the treatment of mitral regurgitation (MR). Mitral regurgitation is the most common heart valve disease, is closely associated with congestive heart failure (CHF) impacting 3-4 times more patients than aortic valve disease.
Today the only definitive treatment for mitral regurgitation requires open heart surgery (annuloplasty). With many patients at high risk for open heart surgery and others not sick enough --- yet, to justify surgery, only a small percentage of patients are offered a surgical annuloplasty procedure, leaving physicians to try and manage the patient’s symptoms with "watchful waiting" as their disease progresses.
MitraGen’s TMVR technologies will allow an interventional cardiologist to repair the mitral valve in a minimally invasive, cardiac cath lab procedure, replicating the clinical results of a surgical annuloplasty procedure. This will allow physicians to provide definitive treatment to the huge group of patients considered too sick for surgery as well as providing a minimally invasive alternative for patients earlier in their disease process, before their cardiac disease has progressed and they have been seriously compromised.
Transcatheter technologies are rapidly changing the way physicians treat heart valve disease and MitraGen will set the "standard of care" for transcatheter mitral valve repair.