eng Science and Education Publishing American Journal of Medical Case Reports 2374-216X 2020-05-22 8 9 257 261 10.12691/ajmcr-8-9-1 AJMCR2020891 article Pramod Theetha Kariyanna 1 Ashkan Tadayoni 1 Amog Jayarangaiah 2 Sudhanva Hegde 2 Apoorva Jayaranagaiah 3 Moro O. Salifu 3 Isabel M. McFarlane Isabel.McFarlane@downstate.edu 3 Department of Internal Medicine, State University of New York, Downstate Health Sciences University, Brooklyn, NY 11203, U.S.A. Trinity School of Medicine, 925 Woodstock Road, Roswell, GA 30075, U.S.A. Department of Internal Medicine, Albert Einstein College of medicine/ Jacobi Medical Center, Bronx, N.Y., U.S.A. Cardiac free wall rupture (CFWR) is an uncommon complication of myocardial infarction, cardiac-based procedures, and blunt chest trauma. Cardiac tamponade and shock which occurs as a result of CFWR results in a high mortality rate. Despite the high mortality rate, there is a window of opportunity for intervention in selected patients with acute or subacute free wall rupture. Hence, prompt diagnosis and intervention are key to prevent cardiac tamponade and death. Even though emergency surgical repair is the standard treatment for the CWFR, the catheter-based procedure has provided an alternative treatment option, especially, in the high-risk surgical patients. For instance, Amplatzer occluder® (AO), a device which is used in repairing congenital septal wall defect, is being used as an alternative method of treatment in CFWR. In this systemic review, we assessed the 19 cases of CFWR occurring after invasive cardiac procedures who underwent repair with the utilization of AO®. The study shows that the successful rate of percutaneous closure of CFWR was 84.3% (16/19) with a mortality rate of 15.7% (3/19) in this cohort. Therefore, the in-hospital mortality rate of CFWR closure is comparable with the average in-house mortality rate of emergency surgical repair which is 14%. Furthermore, we found that AO® placement technique has a lower mortality rate compared to the other less-invasive methods such as percutaneous intrapericardial fibrin-glue injection which has a mortality rate of 25%. In conclusion, employing AO® in CFWR repair not only serves as the treatment of choice in the high-risk surgical candidates but could also be applied as an alternative method in the general population. However, further studies are required to assess the outcome and mortality rate of using AO® in CFWR to provide us with a more consistent and accurate data. http://pubs.sciepub.com/ajmcr/8/9/1/ajmcr-8-9-1.pdf Amplatzer occluder Cardiac free wall rupture acute myocardial complication catheter-based procedure surgical repair mortality