Mitral Valve Complex

This is the study of mitral valve complex in 116 human cadaveric hearts. The mitral valve complex consists of the mitral valve annulus, leaflets, chordae tendinae and papillary muscles. Each component of the mitral valve complex is studied in detail. Results found in the study are very surprising and interesting, particularly about the mitral valve cusps and the papillary muscles. The standard description of the mitral valve is bicuspid. Tricuspid mitral valve, tetracuspid mitral valves, pentacuspid mitral valves are the rare terminologies to hear. The results found in the present study, forced us to classify the mitral valve according to the number of cusps, from monocuspid to hexacuspid mitral valve accordingly. This classification of mitral valve is described in the book with clear photographs. Chordae tendinae word clicks a tendinous structure but in results we also found the muscular and membranous chordae seen in 14% and 6% respectively of the valve studied. Papillary muscles were mostly found in groups instead of in twos. Four shapes of papillary muscles were identified as conical, broad-apexed, pyramidal and fan-shaped. We also studied various patterns of papillary muscles.