• Jeng Wei, Yung-Tsai Lee, and Ching-Wen Wu.
• Heart Center, Cheng-Hsin General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan.
• Eur J Cardiothorac Surg. 2019 Jul 1; 56 (1): 189-196.

ObjectivesWe used a vascular ring connector (Vasoring) and a conventional elephant trunk graft for complete repair in open surgery for type A aortic dissection. This report described the immediate and mid-term results of this new technique.MethodsWe used a rigid titanic ring as a stent in the vascular graft for rapid sutureless anastomosis in the reconstruction of type A aortic dissection.ResultsA total of 65 consecutive patients with Stanford type A aortic dissection underwent open surgery performed by a single surgeon from November 2007 to February 2017. All patients underwent aortic reconstruction with vascular grafts and Vasorings (21 patients in the ascending aorta and 44 patients in the total aortic arch). For total aortic arch replacement, we implanted the conventional vascular graft in the proximal descending thoracic aorta as an elephant trunk graft. Concomitant procedures included the Bentall procedure (9 patients), the David operation (6 patients), coronary artery bypass grafting (9 patients), heart transplantation (1 patient), mitral valve replacement (2 patients) and endovascular aortic repair (1 patient). The mean duration of postoperative endotracheal intubation was 17.0 ± 11.8 h. The average blood loss was 520 ± 743 ml, and 25% of patients required no blood transfusion. The in-hospital mortality rate was 6%.ConclusionsThe combined use of the vascular ring connector and the conventional elephant trunk graft may reduce bleeding and pump time, stop the blood flow in the false lumen and allow the 1-stage total arch replacement to be performed safely. The conventional elephant trunk graft is free from stent graft-induced new entry.© The Author(s) 2019. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the European Association for Cardio-Thoracic Surgery. All rights reserved.

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