3-Dimensional Printing in Transcatheter Aortic Valve Replacement: Periprocedural Value and Training Applications

Abstract

Transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) is a rapidly developing, cutting-edge technology. The skills to perform such procedures are difficult to acquire, and the learning curve is steep. In recent years, structural heart diseases, particularly valvular disease, have become one of the main areas to which 3-dimensional (3D) printing has been applied because it facilitates visualization and exploration of complex cardiovascular anatomical structures. 3D printing also addresses some of the challenges of these interventions, such as patient selection, prosthesis sizing, and of course, teaching and training. 3D printing can provide a valuable resource for teaching and training because it can produce educational models for all types of valvular diseases. A pulsatile platform for the simulation of TAVR with 3D printed models could be used for comprehensive training of young clinicians as part of the overall TAVR teaching and training program. In this review, we introduced the 3D printed model and TAVR simulator, illustrate its training applications in morphology teaching, surgical simulations and preprocedural planning. Additionally, we reviewed studies on 3D printing in predicting periprocedural complications of TAVR, discussed the current limitations and prospected future directions of 3D printing.