| pubmed-article:8713363 | pubmed:abstractText | High prevalence of coronary artery disease in patients with AAA leads to a high rate of peri-operative cardiac complications. Coronary insufficiency is thus the cause of 40 to 60% of post-operative deaths after aortic surgery. Demonstration of coronary insufficiency depends on the clinical history, electrocardiographic evidence, non-invasive examinations and coronarography. Diagnosis is based on non-invasive tests, and of primary importance exercise tests, which have a high sensitivity. Specificity for predicting post-operative cardiac complications remains low but can be improved by combining with other tests (for example exercise test and Holter recording) or with other clinical parameters. Coronarography provides a precise map of the coronary status but gives little information on functional impairment of encountered lesions. Finally, besides the cost and a certain degree of morbidity, coronarography increases the number of indications for revascularizations with the inconvenience of its intrinsic mortality and also retards the operation increasing the risk of rupture. The evaluation of cardiac risk before surgery must be based on correct use of non-invasive tests, limiting coronarography to cases with frankly positive tests. | lld:pubmed |
