A baboon flow-regulated shunt for the study of small caliber vascular grafts

Synthetic vascular grafts often occlude when used in low-flow high-resistance reconstructions. In order to study the pathophysiology of graft failure a flow-regulated ex vivo shunt was designed for insertion into the baboon femoral artery and vein. Synthetic graft materials (4 mm i.d.) can be placed into the shunt circuit and studied at known rates of flow for uptake of 111In-labeled platelets. Segments of the grafts can be removed from the shunt circuit at specified time intervals for morphologic study with scanning electron microscopy (SEM). In this paper the shunt model is described in detail and early experiments with it are reported. Labeled platelet uptake and SEM studies suggest that flow rate and graft composition influence the deposition of platelets and other blood components on graft surfaces. At high-flow knitted Dacron attracts large numbers of platelets, and becomes covered with a nearly confluent platelet-protein carpet within 1 hr. At low flow platelet uptake and development of the platelet-protein carpet is slower. Polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) attracts few platelets at high-flow rates, but at lower-flow rates begins to develop a platelet-protein carpet similar to that seen on knitted Dacron. Flow-related factors influencing platelet deposition are discussed and further experiments to be carried out with this model are described.