It's known as an aortic dissection, and it's probably the most devastating condition that can affect the heart. A rip in the lining of the aorta -- the main artery leading away from the heart -- allows blood to spill down an adjacent channel. Patients with aortic dissections can die of complications within a week.
A device known as a stent-graft offers a promising, minimally invasive treatment, says Michael Dake, an associate professor of radiology and medicine. Doctors collapse the device inside a catheter and thread it through the blood vessels from the patient's groin to the aorta. Once in place, the stent-graft opens as the catheter is withdrawn and expands to fill the vessel, effectively covering the hole. The adjacent channel is shut off, allowing blood to flow normally. Sixteen out of 19 patients fitted with experimental stent-grafts recovered.
Doctors have spent nearly four decades looking for an alternative to major surgery in such cases. The stent-graft may be the answer. "We were able to avoid a major operation in 18 of these 19 people, and the results were quite respectable, considering how sick they were," says Craig Miller, a professor of cardiothoracic surgery and a co-author of the study. "It is really a landmark advance."
