Stent features and methods to aid with apposition and alignment to native anatomy, mitigation of paravalvular leak and functional efficiency of prosthetic heart valve

Abstract

An expandable and collapsible stent comprising prosthetic leaflets attached to an inner valve support section that extends radially upward into an outer stent section. A transition stent section is disposed between the inner valve support section and the outer stent section. Each of the outer stent section, the inner valve support section and the transition stent section may comprise struts or the equivalent that form and define cells having a pattern, wherein each section may comprise a different cell pattern. Transition stent section preferably comprises struts that are of equal curvature, with adjacent struts equally spaced from each other to allow nested collapsing of the transition stent section struts. A boss section extending downstream away from the inner valve support section may be provided to aid in alignment and retention of the expanded stent and may comprise a shape that is complementary to a heart chamber annulus.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.