Late survival after abdominal aortic aneurysm repair

Objectives: this study was undertaken to determine the late survival of pat ients operated successfully for abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) repair, to compare survival data with that of the age- and sex-matched general populat ion, to identify the causes of late death, and to determine the factors inf luencing late survival. Materials and methods: a total of 187 consecutive patients underwent electi ve surgical AAA repair between January 1987 and December 1991. There were 1 1 postoperative deaths (early mortality rate 5.9%). The remaining 176 patie nts formed the basis of this cohart-based retrospective study. Six patients (3.4%) were lost to follow-up. Mean follow-up was 71 months. Results: a total of 70 patients (39.8%) died during the study period. Coron ary artery disease (CAD) and cancer were the two main causes. The survival rate at five years (71.6%) was lower than that of the sex- and age-matched general population (90.6%). Neither arterial hypertension nor CAD had any i nfluence on late survival. In contrast, age and chronic renal failure were predictive variables of late survival. Conclusions: the life expectancy of patients who undergo successful AAA rep air is not as good as that of the age- and sex-matched general population. Late survival depends on the patients' age at the time of surgery and the e xistence of preoperative chronic renal failure.