СONGENITAL ABNORMALITIES OF THE INFERIOR VENA CAVA AND ITS TRIBUTARIES: THEIR RADIOLOGICAL DIAGNOSIS AND CLINICAL SIGNIFICANCE

Abstract

Abnormalities of the inferior vena cava (IVC) and its tributaries are a very rare congenital defect with an incidence of 0.6 to 3% and a wide variety of anatomical variants. In most cases, it is an accidental diagnostic finding in patients undergoing examination for other pathologies. Not infrequently, the anatomic IVC variants are ignored at the stage of exploratory diagnostic assessment due to their rarity, difficulties of identification and perhaps insufficient awareness of a radiologist in this field. It is known that some IVC abnormalities are associated with certain symptoms, and others could be a predictor of deep vein thrombosis. The information on characteristics of the IVC anatomical structure is necessary during interventional manipulation on the retroperitoneal organs and vasculature, because the presence of an atypically located vessel can lead to significant variations in the surgery protocol and potential intraoperative complications. The problems of embryogenesis, classification, variant anatomy, clinical significance and diagnostics of various abnormalities of IVC and its tributaries are discussed in this review.

Keywords

• inferior vena cava, congenital abnormalities, deep vein thrombosis