A non-sutured intra-luminal graft for the management of thoracic and thoraco-abdominal aneurysms

Abstract

Increasingly, thoracic and supra-renal aortic aneurysms are considered operable because of improvements in surgical and anaesthetic technology. Anaesthetic techniques have been evolved to cope with the immense circulatory effects and changes in cardiac function associated with clamping and declamping of the thoracic aorta (1) and inlay techniques of grafting have simplified the reconstructive procedure. However, two problems, excessive blood loss and visceral and spinal cord ischaemia, continue to give rise to relatively high morbidity rates associated with these operations.