IMR Press / RCM / Volume 9 / Issue 3 / pii/1560999980749-1152808330

Reviews in Cardiovascular Medicine (RCM) is published by IMR Press from Volume 19 Issue 1 (2018). Previous articles were published by another publisher in Open Access under a CC-BY (or CC-BY-NC-ND) licence, and they are hosted by IMR Press on imrpress.com as a courtesy and upon agreement with MedReviews, LLC.

Open Access Review
Patent Foramen Ovale: Clinical Manifestations and Treatment
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1 Division of Medicine, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, CA
2020 Division of Cardiology, The David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, Los Angeles, CA
Rev. Cardiovasc. Med. 2008, 9(3), 168–173;
Published: 30 September 2008
Abstract
A persistent patent foramen ovale produces an intermittent intra-atrial right-to-left shunt and occurs in approximately 25% of the general population. Although the vast majority of people with patent foramen ovale are asymptomatic, a patent foramen ovale is believed to act as a pathway for chemicals or thrombus that can result in a variety of clinical manifestations, including stroke, migraine headache, decompression sickness, high-altitude pulmonary edema, and platypnea-orthodeoxia syndrome. The optimal management of patients with patent foramen ovale who experience cryptogenic stroke is unclear. Percutaneous closure appears to have a low risk profile and has been considered in high-risk patients who are not candidates for randomized clinical trials. Randomized clinical trials that are underway should help define the best management of patent foramen ovale, as well as the true safety and efficacy of percutaneous closure devices.
Keywords
Patent foramen ovale
Migraine
Stroke
Echocardiogram
Transcranial Doppler
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