ORIGINAL ARTICLES   

Giornale Italiano di Chirurgia Vascolare 2000 September;7(3):201-13

Copyright © 2001 EDIZIONI MINERVA MEDICA

language: English, Italian

Dacron knitted graft dilation assessment with helical CT scanning after aortoiliac surgery

Ippoliti A., Di Giulio L., Bortot M., Carpanese L., Pistolese G. R.,

From the Department of Vascular Surgery Ospedale S. Eugenio, Rome, Italy “Tor Vergata” University of Rome, Italy

Background. Dacron knit­ted ­graft dila­tion assess­ment ­with hel­i­cal CT scan­ning ­after aor­toi­liac sur­gery.
Methods. We fol­lowed up twen­ty ­patients who under­went bifur­cat­ed Dacron knit­ted ­graft implan­ta­tion for ­either aneu­rys­mat­ic or obstruc­tive aor­toi­liac dis­ease: 10 Vascutek gel­soft ­plus ® (study ­group) and 10 Meadox Hemashield Microvel ® (con­trol ­group) by ­means of con­trast-­enhanced hel­i­cal CT scan­ning on post­op­er­a­tive day 10 and ­three and six ­months lat­er. Both the ­study ­group (­mean age: 69.3 ­years; one ­female) and con­trol ­group (­mean age: 65.9 ­years, all ­males) ­were homo­ge­ne­ous for ­risk fac­tors. In the ­first ­group, 8 ­patients pre­sent­ed abdom­i­nal aor­tic aneu­rysm, and two low­er ­limb obstruc­tive dis­ease; in the con­trol ­group, 9 sub­jects pre­sent­ed abdom­i­nal aor­tic aneu­rysm and one low­er ­limb obstruc­tive dis­ease. Patients in ­both ­groups ­were ­also clas­si­fied as nor­mo­ten­sive, hyper­ten­sive ­with phar­mac­o­log­i­cal con­trol and hyper­ten­sive with­out phar­mac­o­log­i­cal con­trol.
Results. Mean ear­ly dila­tion of the ­graft ­body was 15.5% in the ­study ­group and 21.5% in the con­trol ­group; ­mean ear­ly dila­tion of ­graft ­limbs was 9.9% and 18.3%, respec­tive­ly. No fur­ther dila­tion was record­ed ­either ­three or six ­months lat­er. No sta­tis­ti­cal­ly sig­nif­i­cant dif­fer­enc­es ­were ­found ­between nor­mo­ten­sive and hyper­ten­sive ­patients.
Conclusions. Early ­graft dila­tion ­does not ­appear to be a ­real prob­lem, but mere­ly the phys­io­log­i­cal adjust­ment of ­graft tis­sue. Further ­research ­will eval­u­ate any prog­nos­tic sig­nif­i­cance. Surgery is ­required in the ­event of com­pli­ca­tions.