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Endovascular aneurysm repair is a treatment option used to minimize the risk of a thoracic aortic aneurysm opening up. It is an alternative to open surgical repair. A thoracic aortic aneurysm is an abnormal widening or ballooning of a portion of the body's largest artery (the aorta) that passes through the chest.
For endovascular repair of a thoracic aneurysm, surgeons use long, thin tubes called catheters threaded through your blood vessels to place a fabric tube, called a stent-graft, inside the weakened portion of the aorta. The graft is stronger than the weakened aorta and allows blood to pass through it without causing a bulge. The catheters are inserted in small incisions in the groin and are guided through the blood vessels. During the procedure, the vascular surgeon will use live x-ray pictures viewed on a video screen to guide a stent-graft to the site of the aneurysm.
Endovascular stent-graft repair allows surgeons to repair the aneurysm without cutting open the chest and without putting the patient on a heart-lung machine. It requires a shorter recovery time than open surgical aneurysm repair, with the hospital stay reduced to two or three days.
An additional advance in treatment involves the use of a fenestrated stent-graft, which is a stent that is custom-fitted to the patient’s body. Vascular surgeons at TriHealth Heart & Vascular Institute were the first to utilize the fenestrated stent in Cincinnati.
We use endovascular aneurysm repair to treat the following vascular conditions:
A thoracic aortic aneurysm is an expansion or bulge in the artery wall resulting from a weakening of the artery wall.