Safety and feasibility of unilateral double femoral venous access including double sheath insertion via a single-hole method for adrenal venous sampling

High Deep Femoral Artery Bifurcation Can Disturb Safe Femoral Venous Access: CT Assessment in Patients Who Underwent Femoral Venous Access Under Doppler Ultrasound Guidance

PURPOSE

To retrospectively evaluate the variations of deep femoral artery (DFA) bifurcation on computed tomography (CT) and technical success in femoral venous access.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

CT images of 353 patients who underwent adrenal venous sampling were evaluated. Height with relation to the inferior border of the femoral head and direction of DFA bifurcations were classified as follows: type L, low bifurcation; type H1, high lateral bifurcation; type H2, high posterior to posterolateral bifurcation; type H3, high posteromedial bifurcation; and type H4, high medial bifurcation crossing in front of the femoral vein. Technical success and complications during femoral venous access were also evaluated.

RESULTS

The frequencies of types L, H1, H2, H3, and H4 were 82.7%, 9.1%, 6.9%, 0.4%, and 0.9%, respectively. In 92.2% of type H1 and 69.4% of type H2, the superior femoral artery displaced medially by the high DFA partially overlapped the femoral vein. Upon the inclusions of H3 and H4, in 14.4% of cases, the high DFAs could obstruct the access route to the femoral vein. Using Doppler ultrasound guidance, no significant differences were observed in the rates of success for puncture in the first attempt (84.5% vs. 75.4%, p = 0.122) and accidental arterial puncture (1.0% vs. 0%, p = 1.00) between low and high DFA bifurcations, respectively.

CONCLUSIONS

High DFA bifurcation is observed in 17.3% of patients and could obstruct the access route to the femoral vein. This can be evaluated using Doppler ultrasound guidance to avoid accidental arterial puncture during femoral venous access.

Feasibility and effectiveness of a single-catheter approach for adrenal vein sampling in patients with primary aldosteronism

BACKGROUND

Adrenal vein sampling (AVS) is the preferred method for subtyping patients with primary aldosteronism, while the procedure is technically challenging. This study evaluated the feasibility and effectiveness of a single-catheter approach for AVS.

METHODS

A retrospective analysis of 106 consecutive patients who underwent AVS was performed to determine the procedural success and complication rates. Bilateral AVS procedures were performed using a single 5-Fr Tiger catheter with repeated manual reshaping.

RESULTS

We successfully advanced the catheter into the bilateral adrenal veins of all patients and reached a 90.6% procedural success rate of AVS. The procedural period was 33.0 ± 8.2 min, the fluoroscopy period was 5.8 ± 1.7 min, and the diagnostic contrast used was 17.3 ± 5.5 ml. Only one patient (0.9%) had a hematoma at the femoral puncture site. No other complications were observed. The operation period gradually shortened as the cumulative number of operations increased. The number of procedures required to overcome the learning curve was about 33 cases.

CONCLUSIONS

The single-catheter approach is feasible and effective for AVS. Moreover, this approach required a relatively short learning curve for an inexperienced trainee.