Background: Although the use of protocols for «enhanced recovery after surgery» (ERAS) have been associated with improved results in different surgical specialties, only a few data are available for ERAS in cardiac surgery. This study aimed to compare 30-day outcomes of patients undergoing ultra-fast-track minimally invasive valve surgery (UFT-MIVS) versus conventional MIVS (c-MIVS).

Methods: The key features of UFT-MIVS approach involves: 1) less invasive valve surgery techniques, 2) normothermic cardiopulmonary bypass management, 3) UFT-anesthesia with table extubation, 4) immediate rehabilitation therapy and patient-family contact. Five-hundred and seventy-six consecutive patients who underwent aortic or mitral MIVS were analyzed (2016-2020). Treatment selection bias (UFT-MIVS vs. c-MIVS) was addressed by the use of propensity score (PS) matching. After PS-matching 2 well-balanced groups of 152 patients each were created.

Results: In the matched cohort, the overall 30-day mortality and stroke rates were 0.3% and 0.7%, respectively, with no difference between groups. UFT-MIVS resulted in lower rates of respiratory insufficiency and agitation/delirium compared with c-MIVS. Patients receiving UFT-MIVS were associated with significantly shorter intensive care unit length of stay and hospital stay.

Conclusions: Our study confirms that MIVS is associated with excellent results in terms of early mortality and major postoperative complications rates. The implementation of UFT-MIVS protocol showed to be safe and was associated with improved clinical outcomes in regard to respiratory insufficiency, delirium and lengths of stay.