Frozen Elephant Trunk Procedure

Aortic arch pathology including aneurysm and dissection poses a significant technical challenge to operative repair, often requiring two-stage repair via sternotomy followed by left thoracotomy. The traditional elephant trunk procedure was developed to facilitate this two-stage approach. With wide adoption of thoracic endovascular aortic repair (TEVAR) emerged the “frozen elephant trunk” (FET) technique, which uses antegrade deployment of TEVAR endografts along with total arch replacement to accomplish a one-stage repair of complex aortic arch pathology.

Source: Operative Techniques in Cardiac and Thoracic Surgery - October 21, 2019 Category: Cardiovascular & Thoracic Surgery Authors: George J. Arnaoutakis, Tomas D. Martin, Thomas M. Beaver Source Type: research