[Surgical treatment of aortic occlusion and obliterating aorto-iliac arteriosclerosis]

From 1985 to March 1991, 83 patients with the diagnosis aortoiliac obliteration and aortic occlusion were operated on at the Department of Surgery, Nordland Central Hospital. The main symptom was claudicatio intermittens. 16 patients had pain while at rest, and two had gangrene. The surgical technique was either Y-prosthesis or thrombendarterectomy. Four patients (4.8%) died postoperatively, three of myocardial infarction and one of intestinal ischemia and peritonitis. In our study 66 patients with aortoiliacal atherosclerosis were compared with 17 patients with aortic occlusion. Patients with aortoiliacal atherosclerosis demonstrated by angiography had much more severe infrainguinal arterial pathology. In the occlusion group the postoperative outcome, as measured by ankle/brachial index, was significantly better (p < 0.01). The study included four female patients less than 50 years of age with total infrarenal aortic occlusion. Their symptoms and signs are discussed.