Abdominal aorta morphometric study for endovascular treatment of aortic aneurysms: comparison between spiral CT and angiography

PURPOSE: To compare the computed tomography and angiography study of abdominal aortic aneurysms for posterior endograft implant. METHOD: From June 1997 to March 2001, 113 patients with abdominal aortic aneurysm were submitted to study of the aorto-iliac axis with abdominal spiral computed tomography and angiography with calibrated catheter. The patient's ages ranged from 51 and 88 years (mean: 69). There were 104 males and nine females. RESULTS: When comparing the mean computed tomography and angiography diameters, we observed that there was a statistical difference for the infra-renal neck (p<0.05) and for the aortic aneurysm diameters (p<0.001). There was no statistical difference for the iliac artery diameters (p>0.05). When comparing the mean lengths, we observed that there was a statistical difference for the aortic infra-renal neck (p<0.05), for the distance between the renal artery and the aortic bifurcation (p<0.05) and for the common iliac artery lengths (p<0.05). There was also a statistical difference for the length between the renal artery and the internal iliac artery (p<0.05). CONCLUSIONS: In the AAA pre-procedure imaging study there were statistical differences between the computed tomography and angiographic measurement studies. We believe that computed tomography is a superior method for the evaluation of diameters and the angiography with a calibrated catheter for the length evaluation. We conclude, that both methods are complementary and must be undertaken for accurate evaluation of all candidates for aortic endograft implant.