The Placement of Aortic Transcatheter Valve (PARTNER) trial: the view of a cardiologist.

The Placement of Aortic Transcatheter Valves (PARTNER) trial randomized inoperable patients with severe symptomatic aortic stenosis (AS) to medical therapy versus transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) in 1 arm (PARTNER B) and high-surgical-risk AS patients to surgical aortic valve replacement (SAVR) versus TAVR in the other arm (PARTNER A).1,2 TAVR was far superior to medical therapy in PARTNER B, and TAVR had a mortality similar to that of SAVR in PARTNER A. The impact of PARTNER is hard to overestimate. It was an elegant randomized trial in an area of cardiology noted for its dearth of such trials.3 It reiterated the gravity of symptomatic AS and demonstrated the power of a previously unavailable therapy for AS, yet it also expressed caution in the application of this exciting new therapy.