Research article
Elective minimally invasive coronary artery bypass: Shunt or tournique occlusion? Assessment of a protective role of perioperative left anterior descending shunting on myocardial damage. A prospective randomized study
1 Department of Cardiac Surgery, Charles University in Prague, Faculty of Medicine in Hradec Kralove, University Hospital Hradec Kralove, Sokolska 581, 50005, Hradec Kralove, Czech Republic
2 Eva Cermakova, Technology Center, Charles University in Prague, Faculty of Medicine in Hradec Kralove, Simkova 870, 500 38, Hradec Kralove, Czech Republic
3 Radek Pudil, 1st Department of Medicine, Charles University in Prague, Faculty of Medicine in Hradec Kralove, University Hospital Hradec Kralove, Sokolska 581, 50005, Hradec Kralove, Czech Republic
4 Ulrich Alfred Stock, Department of Thoracic, Cardiac and Vascular Surgery, University Hospital Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany
Journal of Cardiothoracic Surgery 2012, 7:69 doi:10.1186/1749-8090-7-69
Published: 18 July 2012Abstract
Background
To determine impact of intraluminal-left anterior descending shunt to prevent myocardial damage in minimally invasive coronary artery bypass.
Methods
38 patients were randomly assigned to external tournique occlusion (n = 19) or intraluminal-left anterior descending shunt group (n = 19). Blood samples for cardiac troponin T were collected at 30 minutes prior to, 6 and 24 hours after surgery.
Results
One patient in external tournique occlusion and two patients in intraluminal-left anterior descending shunt group were excluded from futher analysis due to preoperative cardiac troponin T level above the 99th-percentile. Postoperatively, each six patients in external tournique occlusion (33.3%) and intraluminal-left anterior descending shunt (35.3%) group were above the 99th-percentile. Two patients from each group (external tournique occlusion group 11.1% vs. intraluminal-left anterior descending shunt group 11.8%) had peak values above 10-% coeficient of variation cutoff (p = 1). There were no significant differences in between both groups at all studied timepoints.
Conclusion
There was no protective effect of intraluminal shunting on myocardial damage compared to short-term tournique occlusion. It is upon the surgeon's discretion which method may preferrably be used to achieve a bloodless field in grafting of the non-occluded left anterior descending in minimally invasive coronary artery bypass.
