Endovascular stent-grafts for aneurysms of the femoral and popliteal arteries

Our objective was to investigate the preliminary use of endovascular stent- grafts for the treatment of femoropopliteal artery aneurysm. Ten patients w ith an aneurysm of the femoropopliteal artery referred for endovascular tre atment were investigated. The series consisted of patients with a true aneu rysm of the superficial femoral artery (n = 2); a true aneurysm of the popl iteal artery (n = 4); an aneurysmal dilatation of a Biograft bypass (n = 2) ; a false aneurysm of the superficial femoral aneurysm (n = 1); and a false aneurysm of a composite bypass (n = 1). In 8 of the 10 patients the stent- graft was composed of one or more Palmaz stents sutured to an ePTFE tube gr aft; in the other 2 patients a venous covering was used in combination with Palmaz stents. The procedure was guided by angiography and intravascular u ltrasound. The results of our investigation showed that endovascular stent- grafting of aneurysms of the femoropopliteal artery is a feasible but exper imental technique that should be restricted to a selected group of patients .