Institutional Review of Hemorrhagic Pelvic Emergencies Effectively Managed with Percutaneous Arterial Embolization

Our aim was to review the results of pelvic arterial embolization (PAE) performed in the interventional radiology suite.

The data of all patients in whom pelvic angioembolization was performed was collected from July 2011 to June 2017. Procedures were performed by an experienced interventional radiologist. The clinical and laboratory data, as well as the outcome data, were obtained from the medical records of our hospital. The following parameters were collected for each patient, including the age, gender, presenting symptoms, site of bleeding, catheters used for embolization, material used for embolization, previous computed tomography (CT) scan and/or focused assessment with sonography for trauma (FAST) ultrasound, average hemoglobin before the procedure, and patient clinical status on discharge.

A total of 37 patients underwent pelvic angiography for acute hemorrhage at our institution. They had contrast blush, active extravasation, or abnormal vascularity from the branches of the internal iliac artery and underwent therapeutic transcatheter embolization. A total of 29 patients (78.3%) were male and 8 (21.7%) were female. The average age was 30.0 years (range: 6-90 year). Of these, 16 patients (43.2%) presented with road traffic accidents (RTAs), six with gunshot injuries (16.2%), six with iatrogenic injuries (16.2%), four with a history of a fall (10.8%), two with bomb blast injuries (5.4%), one with a history of a glass injury (2.7%), one had a history of a roof falling on her during an earthquake, and one patient had a pelvic pseudoaneurysm secondary to an abscess. The type of embolic material used for embolization included coils in 16 patients, polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) particles were used in eight patients, both PVA particles and coils were used in 11 patients, and glue was used in one patient. All were successfully embolized. Thirty-four were discharged while three patients expired during the course of hospital stay due to other coexisting morbidities.

The management of pelvic injuries has always been a topic of debate, with multiple methods reported to date but growing evidence supports the use of pelvic arterial embolization in hemorrhagic pelvic injuries. The formulation of a standardized protocol is the need of the day.