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Preoperative evaluation of the right gastroepiploic artery using abdominal ultrasonography.

Minakawa M, Fukuda I, Wada M, Kaiqiang J, Daitoku K, Itoh K, Fukui K

Department of Surgery I, Hirosaki University School of Medicine, Hirosaki, Japan.

Preoperative evaluation of the right gastroepiploic artery was performed by abdominal ultrasonography to determine whether the graft was adequate for coronary artery bypass. The gastroepiploic artery was used when the graft diameter was greater than 2 mm with pulsatile flow. Postoperative angiography revealed the gastroepiploic artery dominant, and the graft diameter measured by angiography was almost the same size as that of abdominal ultrasonography. The right gastroepiploic artery (GEA) has been an important arterial graft in coronary revascularization, and the opportunities to use this artery as the in situ or free graft have been increasing lately. However we sometimes experience cases in which the GEA is not suitable for the graft because the diameter is not large enough to anastomose or the blood flow is poor. The aim of this study was to evaluate the graftability of the GEA using abdominal ultrasonography preoperatively.

Published 24 August 2006 in Ann Thorac Surg, 82(3): 1131-3.
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