Infection Complicating the Use of Plastic Arterial Implants

THE MANAGEMENT of sepsis has always been a preoccupation of the surgeon. With the development of vascular reconstructive surgery and its necessary reliance upon plastic prosthetic materials, the implications of wound infection are grave and can often result in the death of the patient. It is the purpose of this paper to examine this problem and to suggest means of management and prevention. University of Michigan Experience Between 1953 and 1966, at the University of Michigan affiliated hospitals, 890 aortic bypasses and aortic aneurysmectomies were performed. This represents a large group of patients, all requiring the use of plastic prostheses, and is the only vascular reconstructive procedure considered here. There were 12 infections involving the prosthesis, an incidence of 1.34%. Other authors have recorded a similar incidence varying from 1.1% to 6.0%.1-5The prosthetic material used was knitted Teflon in nine patients and woven Teflon in three. Operative indications