What is rheumatic heart disease?
Rheumatic heart disease is a disease that damages the heart valves as a result of rheumatic fever. Rheumatic fever deveops from strep throat, and is an inflammatory disease that can affect connective tissue throughout the body.  Once a patient develops rheumatic heart disease, they will have it for the rest of their life.

How can I prevent rheumatic heart disease?
The best defense agains rheumatic heart disease is to prevent yourself from ever getting rheumatic fever. You can do this by properly treating strep throat with penicillin or other antibiotics that your doctor may prescribe. If you do develop rheumatic fever, you will be given continuous monthy or daily antibiotic treatment to try to prevent any heart damage from occurring. This continuous antibiotic treatment will probably be long term - possibly even for life. If heart damage is present as a result of rheumatic fever, the chances of developing bacterial endocarditis is much greater.