LAUSR

OBJECTIVE Aim of the study was to evaluate the frequency and type of adverse events that may occurs during the waiting time to complex aortic endovascular repair. METHODS This is a retrospective study of all elective patients with complex aortic aneurysms (including pararenal/suprarenal, thoracoabdominal, or aortic arch aneurysms) that required a custom-made device (CMD) from Cook Medical at a tertiary referral vascular center (Nov 2010 - May 2020). The waiting time was defined as interval between date of stent-graft order and date of procedure or cancellation date. Interval adverse events were defined as any event that occurred during waiting time which led to either mortality, aneurysm rupture, or cancellation of the planned procedure. RESULTS A total of 235 patients (mean age 72 years, 25% females) had a CMD graft ordered (201 planned as single-stage procedures). The median waiting time until surgery was 106 days (IQR:77-146) in the whole cohort and 101 days (IQR:77-140) among single-stage procedures. The planned procedure was carried out electively in 219 (93%), with an overall thirty-day elective mortality of 2% (N=5). There were 16 interval adverse events during waiting time. Of these, 10 were aneurysm ruptures and six were cancellations of the procedure owing to non-aneurysm-related deaths (3% of the entire cohort). A total of 10 interval deaths were registered (4.2%), four were aneurysm-related. Risk of rupture during waiting time (Kaplan-Meier) was 6.1% (SD 2.3) at 180 days. The median time from stent-graft order to aneurysm rupture was 101 days (IQR: 54-200 days). Out of the 10 aneurysm ruptures that occurred, six underwent emergent repair with 0% mortality at thirty-days (one open repair, one T-Branch, one physician-modified endograft, two cases in which the CMD was already available, one case in which a different CMD was available). CONCLUSIONS The median waiting time from stent-graft order to implantation was about fifteen weeks. During this time, a substantial proportion may suffer from adverse events, either related to aneurysm rupture or underlying comorbidity. Rupture risk during waiting time exceeded the risk of perioperative mortality; efforts to decrease this can therefore significantly improve outcome. A combination of different techniques may play a vital role to reduce the mortality in case of interval ruptures.