Anomalies in liver arterial blood supply and their importance for hepatic surgery

Liver arterial system in humans presents wide variability. Knowledge of the variability is important for operation in this region (e.g. port-catheter implantation for regional intraarterial chemotherapy in patients with liver malignancy). The purpose of this study is to determine types of variation of liver artery system and their frequency in Czech population. The research was based on the evaluation of abdominal arteriograms, arteriography findings were confirmed during operations. There were found various anatomical relationships in this area, which may be divided into five types: type I.--standard organization occurred in 75.6% of cases; type II.--presence of accessory artery (8.2%); type III.--variation of hepatic artery origin (7.4%); type IV.--the anomalous origin of gastroduodenal artery (6.9%) and type V.--combination of varieties (1.9%). The most often was the type I that occurred in three quarters of cases approximately.