Direct innominate artery ostial cannulation using retrograde cardioplegia cannula in Type A dissection

Objective: Axillary and innominate artery (IA) cannulation using side graft has some limitations in patients having ascending aortic dissection (AAD) with flap extending in major neck vessels. We retrospectively analyzed the outcomes of a direct under vision innominate ostial cannulation strategy for antegrade cerebral perfusion (ACP) using a retrograde balloon-tip cardioplegia cannula. Patients and Methods: This was a retrospective analysis of all patients who were operated on for AAD with a dissection flap extending into major neck vessels between November 01, 2020 and November 30, 2022. Demographic data were noted, and comorbidities were listed. The kind of surgery patients underwent was noted: three patients underwent modified Bentall's procedure, five had to ascend aortic replacement, and one patient underwent David's procedure. All patients had open distal anastomosis using moderate hypothermia with ACP by direct under vision cannulation of the true lumen of the IA using a balloon-tip retrograde cardioplegia cannula. Intraoperative parameters such as cross-clamp time, cardiopulmonary bypass time, temperature range during circulatory arrest, and total operative time were noted. The primary outcome was a comparison of the incidence of stroke, seizures, and psychosis and the secondary outcome was an analysis of end-organ malperfusion, intensive care unit (ICU) stays, total hospital stay, and 30-day mortality. Results: We retrospectively analyzed the surgical data of nine patients who were operated on between November 01, 2020 and November 20, 2022 by this technique and found that the incidence of stroke, seizures organ malperfusion, ICU stay, and hospital stay was comparable to other techniques of ACP (axillary artery/direct IA cannulation), but the operative time was a less, and local complications due to axillary cannulation such as shoulder pain and upper limb weakness and seroma were not seen. Conclusion: Direct vision cannulation of the true lumen of the IA using a retrograde balloon-tip cannula is a cost-effective and time-saving method. It evades the limitations of well-established ACP techniques such as direct IA cannulation using Seldinger's technique which is a blind procedure and also has no local complications of the cannulating right axillary artery. Our results show that this procedure is less time-consuming and is noninferior to the other two methods of ACP in patients getting operated on for AAD with open distal anastomosis under moderate hypothermia. Further studies with a larger sample size are needed to validate this preliminary study.