| Abstract
| - The internal mammary artery is widely recognized as the graft of choicefor coronary artery bypass grafting at present. Alternative conduits havebeen investigated in order to find other adequate long-term grafts. Theright gastroepiploic artery has been recently used as a graft to bypassdistal coronary vessels. From November 1989 to June 1990, we have implantedthis artery in 46 cases. Pedicled grafts were implanted in 20 patients tothe main right coronary artery, in 21 patients we grafted the right distalbranches, in 3 patients the left anterior descending, and in 2 thecircumflex branches. Mean grafts per patient were 3 in this series, with amean of 2.2 arterial grafts per patient. One patient died in the earlypostoperative period. The remaining patients had an uncomplicatedpostoperative evolution. Thirteen patients underwent graft and coronaryangiography. Direct or indirect graft patency was confirmed in all cases.The final important issue concerning the long-term patency of this graftwill be solved in the future, but short-term patency rates of the rightgastroepiploic artery can be anticipated when proper techniques areused.
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