 Hello, I am Dr. Devananda, Head of the Department of Cardiac Surgery at Manipal Hospitals. I have been practicing cardiac surgery for the last 18 years. As we are aware, our heart has four valves inside it. We have top two valves, which control the blood flow from heart, going out of the heart like iota and pulmonary artery. We also have two more valves inside the heart between the upper and the lower chambers. They are called as atrioventricular valves. On the right side, we call them as tricuspid. On the left side, we call it as mitral valve. The word mitral valve comes from the notion that it resembles the mitre which a bishop wears, bishop's hat, which has got two leaflets which is coming out. It is a very important valve because when the heart tries to pump eject blood out of the heart, it prevents the blood going back into the chamber from where it came. So it performs a very, very important function.