Heliyon (Dec 2023)
Endovascular repair for abdominal aortic aneurysms involving visceral arteries: Effectiveness and contributing factors
Abstract
Objective: Abdominal aortic aneurysms (AAA) involving branches of the visceral arteries mainly refer to AAA with flat renal artery (neck length ≤5 mm) or beyond the renal artery, and the branch of the visceral arteries needs to be reconstructed during treatment. Endoluminal repair (EVR) surgery refers to the isolation of AAA with less surgical trauma through vascular puncture, guidewire, catheter, stent and double suturer technology. However, postoperative endoleak is a complication specific to open surgery. This study aimed to analyze the efficacy of EVR for AAA involving visceral vessels (AAA-Vs) and the factors influencing the occurrence of postoperative endoleak. Methods: A total of 106 patients with AAA-Vs in our hospital during the period of January 2018 to January 2022 were distinguished as the observation group (received EVR, n = 48) and the control group (received laparotomy, n = 58). The operation time, intraoperative bleeding, intraoperative blood transfusion, postoperative intensive care unit (ICU) observation time, postoperative food-taking time, first time out of bed, hospital stay, complications and the one-year mortality of two groups were compared. According to the occurrence of postoperative endoleak, the patients underwent endoluminal repair surgery were graded as non-endoleak group (n = 39) and endoleak group (n = 9). The clinical data, including aneurysm anatomical conditions (proximal neck length, neck diameter, proximal neck angle), tumor shape (normal, calcification, mural thrombus), and internal iliac artery embolism of two groups were compared. Logistic regression analysis was employed to analyze the risk factors of endoleak after EVR of AAA. Results: The operation time, intraoperative blood loss, intraoperative blood transfusion, postoperative ICU observation time, postoperative food-taking time, first time out of bed and hospitalization days were sharply lower in the observation group than the control group (P 0.05). The observation group had much lower incidence of incision infection complications than the control group (P < 0.05). The one-year mortality rate in the observation group was 10.42 %, markedly lower than 25.86 % in the control group (P < 0.05). The incidence of endoleak in the observation group was 18.75 %, while no internal endoleak occurred in the control group (P < 0.05). The proportion of male patients, smoking history, internal iliac artery embolism, and the level of tumor neck length and proximal tumor neck angle in the endoleak group were memorably higher in comparison with the non-endoleak group (P < 0.05). Logistic regression analysis revealed that the length of the neck and the angle of the proximal neck were independent risk factors for postoperative endoleak of AAA (P < 0.05). In conclusion: EVR was effective for AAA-Vs with the advantages of small trauma, rapid recovery, low complication rate and high safety. The diameter of the aneurysm neck and the angle of the proximal aneurysm neck were the risk factors for the occurrence of endoleak after EVR. It was necessary to fully evaluate the aneurysm before operation to help reduce the incidence of endoleak.
