Interruption of gastroesophageal varices: steel coil technique

The Gianturco stainless steel coil occluding device was successfully used in the palliative obliteration of varices in three alcoholic cirrhotic patients via transhepatic catheterization of the portal vein and its tributaries. Complications of the procedure consisted of pulmonary embolization of a 1.3-cm-diam helical coil and contrast-medium-related acute renal failure in one patient with huge gastroesophageal varices. These complications resolved without significant sequelae. The coil has been found to be a simple, rapid, effective means of obliterating varices.