Unselective end-to-side proximal left-gastric-caval shunt without splenectomy. Indications and technique

From 1976 to 1982, 104 patients with bleeding esophageal varices were treated surgically. In three patients a wide left gastric vein without portal flow was demonstrated by means of arterial splenoportography. Ascites estimated at between 4-to-6 liters was observed in two patients. Anemia, leukopenia and platelet counts below 85 X 10(9)/l were shown in all of three. Liver panangiography was performed on all three patients. Given the absence of portal flow, the presence of intractable ascites and the demonstration of a wide left gastric vein, we dissect this vein disconnecting it from the stomach, and performing the anastomosis between the proximal end of this vessel and the inferior vena cava (proximal unselective left gastric caval shunt). Ascites and esophageal varices disappeared in our three patients between one and three weeks after the operation. The shunts were patent between eight months to eight and a half years after the operation. All three patients are still living.