title: Endovascular treatment of thoracic aortic disease: four years of experience.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The aim of this retrospective study is to investigate efficacy and middle-term results of the stent graft treatment for diseases of descending thoracic aorta.
  
  
  RESULTS
  From March 1999 to October 2003, 132 patients (113 male and 19 female, mean age 62+/-14 years) were enrolled. They were divided into 4 groups: aneurysms (43, group A), post-traumatic lesions (24, group B), and complicated type B dissections (43, group C). Twenty-two further patients, with chronic type B dissection and not suitable for endovascular or surgical or hybrid techniques because of multiple entry tears without difference between the true and false lumen and poor clinical conditions, were obliged to receive medical management only (group D). All patients underwent computed tomography (CT) scan and angiography as preoperative assessment. An optimal deployment with exclusion of the aneurysm and/or closure of the entry tear in dissection was achieved in 96.4% (106/110) of the patients that were discharged in good conditions within 6 days. No spinal cord injuries were observed. The follow-up (average 20.82+/-10.01 months, range 1 to 55 months), performed with serial chest CT scans, was 100% complete. No stent graft-related complications were detected, although only in 1 case, an asymptomatic rupture of the Excluder connecting bar was found with a perforation of the fabric and an intra-aortic exposition of the bar itself. In 2 patients with chronic dissection an asymptomatic type II endoleak was detected. A total of 4 hospital deaths resulted in an overall operative mortality of 3.9%. Seven patients (6.3%) died during the follow-up 5 of them for other diseases (4.5%). However, a 40.9% mortality was observed within the obliged medical treatment group.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Endovascular treatment of thoracic aortic diseases, even in the acute phase, may represent a valid option with a low mortality rate. Moreover, the efficacy is proved in the middle-term whereas the long-term follow-up is still pending.
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento Emergenza e Trapianti d'Organo, Sezione di Cardiochirurgia, Piazza Giulio Cesare 11 70124 Bari, Italy. abortone@cardiochir.uniba.it
authors.forename: Alessandro S
authors.initials: AS
authors.lastname: Bortone
authors.forename: Emanuela
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: De Cillis
authors.forename: Donato
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: D'Agostino
authors.forename: Luigi
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: de Luca Tupputi Schinosa
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000784:Aortic Dissection / Q000601:surgery; D017130:Angioplasty / Q000401:mortality; D015906:Angioplasty, Balloon, Coronary; D017545:Aortic Aneurysm, Thoracic / Q000601:surgery*; D001018:Aortic Diseases / Q000601:surgery*; D001161:Arteriosclerosis / Q000601:surgery*; D023921:Coronary Stenosis / Q000150:complications / Q000628:therapy; D018450:Disease Progression; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011183:Postoperative Complications / Q000453:epidemiology; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D015607:Stents; D016896:Treatment Outcome