Millions of people suffer from heart valve disease each year (“American Heart Valve Markets,” 2007). Among all heart valve diseases, “mitral regurgitation is the second most common valve disease” (Baumgartner et al., 2006). This is because the mitral valve experiences the most pressure and blood flow compared to the other valves of the heart (“US Markets for Heart Valves,” 2007). The disease occurs when blood flows back into the left atrium from the left ventricle, which is caused by improper closure of the mitral valve (Lantada et al., 2009). Most of the time, the mitral valve does not function properly due to a structural abnormality (Buckner et al., 2010). These abnormalities can occur either in the papillary cords or in the papillary muscles (Lantada et al., 2009). The frequency of mitral valve abnormalities, particularly in the elderly population, has led to extensive research to find a solution (“US Markets for Heart Valves”, 2007). Many experiments later, a device was born. In the late 1960s, a man named Carpentier developed the first annuloplasty ring (Christenson & Kalangos, 2009). He created this device with the aim of reducing the size of the mitral valve and, therefore, decreasing the severity of mitral regurgitation (Lantada et al., 2009). Annuloplasty rings are designed to facilitate mitral valve repair. Mitral valve repair is preferable to complete replacement. This is mainly because the patient is not required to resort to long-term drug treatment after surgery (Buckner et al., 2010). After valve repair, the annuloplasty ring is sutured to the patient's native mitral annulus. The ring not only reconstructs the shape of the miter...... middle of paper...... Annuloplasty on the three-dimensional geometry of the anterior leaflet. The Journal of Heart Valve Disease 17, 2007. April 5, 2011: 149-154. Hasenkam, Michael J., Henrik Jensen, Morten O. Jensen, Robert A. Levine, Sten L. Nielsen, Hans Nygaard, Morten Smerup, and Ajit P. Yoganathan. “Saddle-shaped mitral valve annuloplasty rings experience lower forces compared to flat rings.” Circulation 118, 2008. April 5, 2011: S250-S255. Lantada, Andres Diaz, Pilar Lafont Morgado, Julio Munoz-Garcia, Juan Manuel Munoz-Guijosa, Javier Echavarri Otero, Jose Luis Munoz Sanz and Raquel Del Valle-Fernandez. “Development of personalized annuloplasty rings: combination of CT images and CAD-CAM tools.” Annals of Biomedical Engineering 38, 2009. March 28, 2011: 280-290. “US Heart Valve Markets”. SAGE Sourcebook of Modern Biomedical Devices: Business Environments, 2007. April 21 2011.