title: Minimally invasive direct coronary artery bypass in a cardiac transplant recipient with allograft vasculopathy.
abstract: Coronary bypass operation with cardiopulmonary bypass has provided disappointing results for the treatment of cardiac allograft vasculopathy (CAV). We describe a 61-year-old man who underwent heart transplantation for secondary dilated cardiomyopathy in 1995. Consecutively, CAV developed with clinically silent left anterior descending occlusion. After angiographic diagnosis in 1998 he successfully underwent a minimally invasive direct coronary artery bypass procedure. Annual coronary angiography showed a patent left internal mammary to left anterior descending bypass graft more than 4 years after operation. In select cases, minimally invasive direct coronary artery bypass is a therapeutic option for the treatment of CAV.
authors.affiliation: Department of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery, University Hospital Essen, Essen, Germany. ivan.aleksic@uni-essen.de
authors.forename: Ivan
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Aleksic
authors.forename: Jarowit A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Piotrowski
authors.forename: Markus
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kamler
authors.forename: Ulf
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Herold
authors.forename: Heinz G
authors.initials: HG
authors.lastname: Jakob
mesh_terms: D001026:Coronary Artery Bypass; D003327:Coronary Disease / Q000209:etiology / Q000601:surgery*; D016027:Heart Transplantation / Q000009:adverse effects*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D019060:Minimally Invasive Surgical Procedures