No abstract

Patency rates for iliac vein percutaneous transluminal angioplasty and stenting in patients with IVCS can potentially be predicted on the basis of a multivariate model. Assessing risk factors allows for patient stratification and appropriate clinical decision making. Prospective validation of these variables is necessary.

Endovascular aortic aneurysm repair induced a significant inflammatory response, mainly involving TNF-alpha and differing from the findings during open AAA repair. These inflammatory responses were probably related to blood pressure decreases during the procedures. On the other hand, conventional repair induced responses related to the more extensive surgical trauma and reperfusion injury.

Placement of self-expanding nitinol stents is safe and has a good long-term palliative effect on dysphagia in patients with malignant esophageal strictures.

A self-expanding esophageal nitinol stent was implanted under fluoroscopic guidance in 40 patients with malignant esophageal strictures and clinically significant dysphagia. The strictures were caused by squamous cell carcinoma (n = 14), adenocarcinoma (n = 12), recurrent anastomotic carcinoma (n = 8), and mediastinal tumors (n = 6). Eight stents were balloon dilated to maximum diameter immediately after insertion. Sixteen stents self-expanded to maximum diameter within 24 hours, and the other stents expanded to maximum diameter during further observation. There were no serious stent-related complications, and the dysphagia was reduced considerably in all patients immediately after stent insertion. Persistent tumor bleeding occurred in two patients, and ingrowth of tumor into the stent was seen in eight patients. Two stents occluded due to tumor ingrowth but were successfully recanalized with endoscopic laser coagulation. At the end of the study, 28 patients were dead with a mean survival of 2.9 months (range, 0.1-7.0 months), and 12 patients were alive with a mean follow-up of 8.8 months (range, 4.0-15.0 months).