Pseudoaneurysm of Superficial Femoral Artery After Balloon Angioplasty

Abstract

This paper presents 2 cases of pseudoaneurysm in the superficial femoral artery (SFA) at the site of dilatation after percutaneous transluminal angioplasty (PTA) in 2 claudicant patients. Localized and calcified tight stenoses in the lower third of the SFA were seen on angiogram. PTA was successful in the first patient, but in the second it failed to open the stenosed part of the artery, and no improvement of the clinical symptoms occurred. Oversized balloons were used in both cases. A localized false aneurysm was seen on angiography four months later in the first patient, and a pulsatile mass in the thigh, corresponding well to the site of the previous PTA, was clinically present three weeks later in the second patient. The diagnosis of pseudoaneurysm was made by intraarterial digital subtraction angiography in the first patient and by color flow duplex imaging (CFDI) in the second. The first patient has maintained a patent SFA with a stable localized false aneurysm at the site of angioplasty fourteen months after the PTA, experiencing only mild claudication, and the second patient underwent a femoropopliteal above-knee bypass operation resulting in relief of the symptoms.