Background
Recent evidence has shown a reduced bleeding risk and resultant decreased morbidity and mortality when the transradial approach is utilized over the transfemoral approach for percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). However, transradial catheterization may introduce acute and/or chronic injury to the radial artery limiting its use for future procedures and as a bypass conduit. Our goal was to utilize optical coherence tomography (OCT) to evaluate the incidence of acute radial artery injury in patients following transradial PCI.
Methods
In this observational study OCT (C7 Dragonfly catheter, St. Jude Medical Systems, St. Paul, MN) was used to evaluate the radial artery of 15 patients at the University of Illinois and Jesse Brown Veterans Affairs Medical Centers in Chicago, IL following transradial PCI. Specific injuries assessed for included radial artery dissection and thrombus formation. Diameter and cross sectional area of the artery were taken proximally and distally. Measurements were taken independently by two separate readers to account for inter-reader variability.
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