REVIEW  SFA MANAGEMENT 

The Journal of Cardiovascular Surgery 2019 October;60(5):572-81

DOI: 10.23736/S0021-9509.19.11038-5

Copyright © 2019 EDIZIONI MINERVA MEDICA

language: English

How to deal with calcium in the superficial femoral artery

Konstantinos STAVROULAKIS ¹ ✉, Angeliki ARGYRIOU ¹, Mike WATTS ², Joji J. VARGHESE ³, Bailey A. ESTES ³, Giovanni TORSELLO ¹, Theodosios BISDAS ⁴, Bella HUASEN ⁵

¹ Department of Vascular Surgery, St. Franziskus Hospital GmbH, Münster, Germany; ² Vascular Institute of Atlantic Medical Imaging, Brick, Galloway, and Cape May Court House, NJ, USA; ³ Department of Interventional Cardiology, Hendrick Medical Center, Abilene, TX, USA; ⁴ Department of Vascular Surgery, Athens Medical Center, Athens, Greece; ⁵ Department of Interventional Radiology, Royal Preston LTHTR, Manchester, UK

Despite the continuous evolution of endovascular therapy, severe calcification remains a major issue for the minimally invasive treatment of superficial femoral artery (SFA) disease. The presence of calcium might negatively affect both the crossing of peripheral lesions and outcomes of all available treatment modalities and is therefore associated with unfavorable acute and long-term results. This manuscript summarizes the challenges raised from severe calcified atherosclerotic lesions and presents the outcomes of the various endovascular modalities in the treatment of calcified SFA disease.

KEY WORDS: Calcium; Vascular calcification; Peripheral arterial disease; Endovascular procedures; Femoral artery