Transluminal Dilatation With Separate Teflon Catheters

Abstract

The purpose of percutaneous transluminal dilatation of atheromatous obstructions in the arterial tree is to diminish or to abolish their hemodynamic activity through compression of the atheromatous material against the arterial wall by introducing fairly thick catheters or balloon catheters into the artery. In this way the atheromatous mass is compressed and most likely also redistributed longitudinally. Or, as Dotter (3) says, the rationale of the technique is compression and remodeling. The method implies that nothing is removed, nothing is detached, and the atheromatous material is not embolized. Since in the human body only gases are compressible, something has to be squeezed out when the atheromatous mass is pressed between the catheter and the surrounding arterial wall to reduce the volume of the mass. Dotter reports that a transient increase in blood lipids was demonstrated in the blood of femoral veins during a transluminal dilatation of the femoral arteries. Only the lumen becomes enlarged, not the artery itself.