The presence of chronic heart failure (CHF) results in a significant risk of leg oedema. Medical compression (MC) treatment is one of the basic methods of leg oedema elimination in patients with chronic venous disease and lymphedema, but it is not routinely considered in subjects with CHF-related swelling. In the study, an overview of the current knowledge related to the benefits and risk of using MC in the supportive treatment of leg oedema in CHF patients is presented. The available studies dedicated the comprehensive management of leg swelling using MC in CHF patients published in the English language literature till December 2019 were evaluated in term of the treatment efficacy and safety. In studies performed on CHF populations, manual lymphatic drainage, MC stocking, multilayer bandaged, as well as intermittent pneumatic compression or electric calf stimulations were used. The current evidence is based on non-randomized studies, small study cohorts, as well as very heterogenous populations. The use of the intermittent pneumatic compression in CHF patients significantly increases the right auricular pressure and mean pulmonary artery pressures as well as decreases systemic vascular resistance in most patients without the clinical worsening. The transient and rapid increase in the human atrial natriuretic peptide, after an application of the MC stocking in New York Heart Association (NYHA) class II patients was observed without clinical exacerbation. An application of the multilayer bandages in NYHA classes III and IV patients lead a significant increase in the right arterial pressure and lead to transient deterioration of the right and the left ventricular functions. In the manual lymphatic drainage study, aside from expected leg circumference reduction, no clinical worsening was observed. In a pilot study performed in a small cohort of CHF patients, electrical calf stimulation use resulted in a reduction in the lean mass of the legs without cardiac function worsening. The use of local leg compression can be considered stable CHF patients without decompensated heart function for both CHF-related oedema treatment and for treatment of the concomitant diseases leading to leg swelling occurrence. The use of MC in more severe classes of CHF (NYHA III and IV) should be the subject of future clinical studies to select the safest and most efficient compression method as well as to select the patients who benefit most from this kind of treatment.

A b s t r a c tBackground: The rate of aortic aneurysm rupture correlates with the aneurysm's diameter, and a higher rate of rupture is observed in patients with larger aneurysms. According to the literature, contradictory results concerning the relationship between atmospheric pressure and aneurysm size have been reported. Aim:In this paper, we assessed the influence of changes in atmospheric pressure on abdominal aneurysm ruptures in relationship to the aneurysm's size. Methods:The records of 223 patients with ruptured abdominal aneurysms were evaluated. All of the patients had been admitted to the department in the period 1997-2007 from the Silesia region. The atmospheric pressures on the day of the rupture and on the days both before the rupture and between the rupture events were compared. The size of the aneurysm was also considered in the analysis.Results: There were no statistically significant differences in pressure between the days of rupture and the remainder of the days within an analysed period. The highest frequency of the admission of patients with a ruptured aortic aneurysm was observed during periods of winter and spring, when the highest mean values of atmospheric pressure were observed; however, this observation was not statistically confirmed. A statistically non-significant trend towards the higher rupture of large aneurysms (> 7 cm) was observed in the cases where the pressure increased between the day before the rupture and the day of the rupture. This trend was particularly pronounced in patients suffering from hypertension (p = 0.1). Conclusions:The results of this study do not support the hypothesis that there is a direct link between atmospheric pressure values and abdominal aortic aneurysm ruptures.

Purpose: Kidney failure influences the treatment outcomes of abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA). A prospective study of renal function before and after aortic stent-graft treatment was performed. Special attention was paid to the influence of preoperative kidney function as well as the impact of the radiological follow-up. Material and methods:A total of 214 endovascularly treated AAA patients were included. In all cases, pre-and postoperative estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) and serum creatinine were noted. Patients were prospectively followed up for a minimum of two years. Results:The baseline eGFR was 69.38 ± 16.29 ml/min/1.73 m 2 . Chronic kidney disease at baseline was noted in 29% of patients. In the direct postoperative period, acute kidney injury was identified in 8.4% of cases. Additional endovascular procedures within two years of observation were performed in 5.6% of cases, and over the two years of follow-up, in the study group from one to six angio-computed tomographic scans (angio-CT) per patient were performed. The mean eGFR value after the 24-month follow-up was significantly lower than the preoperative value. Among the factors influencing kidney function, an angio-CT during the same hospital stay of the primary stent-graft procedures was identified. The type of stent-graft, contrast volume during the primary procedure, need for reintervention, concomitant disease presence, and statin use did not show statistical significance.Conclusions: Angio-CT followed by stent-graft implantation over a short time interval (within the same hospitalisation) significantly worsened renal function in the late follow-up and should be avoided in elective AAA cases.

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Background: A ruptured abdominal aortic aneurysm is a severe condition associated with high mortality. Currently, the most important criterion used to estimate the risk of its rupture is the size of the aneurysm, but due to patients’ anatomical variability, many aneurysms have a high risk of rupture with a small aneurysm size. We asked ourselves whether individual differences in anatomy could be taken into account when assessing the risk of rupture. Methods: Based on the CT scan image, aneurysm and normal aorta diameters were collected from 186 individuals and compared in patients with ruptured and unruptured aneurysms. To take into account anatomical differences between patients, diameter ratios were calculated by dividing the aneurysm diameter by the diameter of the normal aorta at various heights, and then further comparisons were made. Results: It was found that the calculated ratios differ between patients with ruptured and unruptured aneurysms. This observation is also present in patients with small aneurysms, with its maximal size below the level that indicates the need for surgical treatment. For small aneurysms, the ratios help us to estimate the risk of rupture better than the maximum sac size (AUC: 0.783 vs. 0.650). Conclusions: The calculated ratios appear to be a valuable feature to indicate which of the small aneurysms have a high risk of rupture. The obtained results suggest the need for further confirmation of their usefulness in subsequent groups of patients.