Endovascular Treatment of Innominate Artery Bifurcation Injury with Balloon-Expandable Covered Stents Utilizing Kissing Stent Technique.

Major injury of the innominate artery is traditionally treated with an open repair which is technically challenging, associated with large volumes of blood loss and prolonged operative times. Endovascular treatment with covered stent placement across the injury is an attractive alternative. However, placement of a single covered stent across the innominate artery bifurcation into one of its distal branches will not prevent bleeding because of retrograde perfusion from the unstented branch distal to the bifurcation. Here, we report a case of successful endovascular repair of one such injury involving the innominate artery bifurcation with ongoing extravasation into the mediastinum. The injury was successfully treated by utilizing 2 balloon-expandable covered stents placed in kissing fashion from the innominate artery into both of its distal branches. This technique of parallel covered stent placement across a bifurcation could effectively repair bifurcation injuries while maintaining patency of both distal branches.

Inferior vena cava perforation during percutaneous filter removal.

BACKGROUND: Percutaneous Inferior Venacava (IVC) filter retrieval can be challenging when the filter is grossly angulated, embedded in the wall or penetrates through the IVC. When conventional filter removal technique fails, the use of advanced retrieval techniques often improves the chances of percutaneous filter retrieval. These techniques, however, are associated with a high rate of complications. METHODS: We report a case of 26-year-old female who had IVC filter placed on postpartum day 4. Attempted percutaneous filter retrieval 3 weeks later with loop snare technique and endobronchial forceps assisted filter removal technique resulted in gross filter deformity, malposition, and IVC perforation. RESULT: Open IVC filter removal was performed with midline laparotomy and cavotomy with lateral venorrhapy. The deformed filter along with adherent thrombus was completely removed. The patient had an uneventful recovery with no immediate or long-term complications. CONCLUSION: Use of advanced endovascular IVC filter retrieval techniques could result in serious complications like filter fracture, migration and IVC perforation. Since excessive tilt of the filter at the time of placement often results in difficult retrieval, it is important to ensure proper deployment of the filter with minimal tilt. If encountered with excessively tilted or embedded filter, one should refrain from excessive manipulation of the filter and consider open filter removal.

Echocardiography and Management for Cardiac Trauma.

Trauma is the number one cause of death among Americans between the ages of 1 and 46, costing >$670 billion a year. Blunt and penetrating trauma can lead to cardiac and aortic injuries, with the incidence of death varying upon the location of the damage. Among those who reach the hospital alive, many may survive if the hemorrhage and cardiovascular injuries are diagnosed and treated adequately in a timely fashion. Although echocardiography often is underused in the setting of cardiac trauma, it offers significant diagnosis and treatment potential because it is accessible in most settings, safe, relatively noninvasive, and can provide rapid and accurate trauma assessment in the hands of trained providers. This review article aims to analyze the pathophysiology of cardiac injuries in patients with trauma and the role of echocardiography for the accurate diagnosis of cardiac injury in trauma. This review, additionally, will offer a patient-centered, team-based, early management plan with a treatment algorithm to help improve the quality of care among these patients with cardiac trauma.

Endovascular Repair of Transected Axillary Artery via Snare Assisted Through and Through Femoral to Brachial Artery Access.

Axillary artery injury is a rare but complex surgical problem that often requires challenging exposures, lengthy operations, and morbid outcomes for repair. For these reasons, endovascular repair is an attractive alternative as it obviates many of the challenges present with open repair. While pseudoaneurysms, dissections, and short segment injuries with limited arterial disruption are regularly treated endovascularly, complete arterial transections are almost exclusively treated with open repair as obtaining wire access across the site of injury is often not possible. Here we report a case of successful endovascular repair of a completely transected axillary artery with the use of snare assistance to obtain through and through femoral to brachial artery access. This ultimately allowed for covered stent deployment across the axillary transection restoring distal blood flow. Snare assistance in obtaining through and through access across areas of complete transection can allow for increased use of endovascular repair.

Endovascular Treatment of Giant Celiac Artery Aneurysm in Behcet's Disease.

We report a case of a 17-year-old male with Behcet's disease (BD) with giant celiac artery aneurysm and impending rupture. Over the past 8 weeks, patient began having intermittent back and abdominal pain that worsened and became persistent over the past few days. This was accompanied by anorexia and non-bilious vomiting. Computed tomography angiogram (CTA) demonstrated a wide neck large celiac artery aneurysm (60 mm diameter). Endovascular repair of the aneurysm was performed using stent graft of the aorta and transcatheter coil embolization of the aneurysm sac. Technical success was confirmed by interruption of flow in the aneurysm, and preservation of distal native circulation at the conclusion of the procedure. One-week post-embolization, a CTA demonstrated complete thrombosis of the aneurysm. On follow-up CTA at 3, 6, and 12 months after embolization, the aneurysm has completely thrombosed and decreased in size to 24 mm. Patient remains asymptomatic till date.