Bone Arteriography of the Femoral Head of Humans in Normal and Pathological Conditions

Abstract

Human femoral head has a specific vascular anatomy. Many studies were reported for investigations about this condition using angiography in vivo (Hipp, 1968; Mussbichler, 1956) and microangiography of autopsy (Chung, 1976; Sevitt, 1965; Trueta and Harrison, 1953; Trueta, 1957). However, it is difficult to demonstrate these arteries clearly in vivo, especially in the pathological conditions. Superselective angio-graphy of the hip was reported by Theron (1977) and this method was able to demonstrate the vascular changes of the femoral head in vivo (Atsumi et al., 1990, 1992). Microangiography of affected femoral head which was resected at operation (Atsumi et al., 1989) could be effective for observation of the details of vascular changes of the femoral head in pathological conditions. I investigated the vascular changes of the femoral head in normal and pathological conditions using superselective angiography of the femoral medial circumflex artery and microangiography of affected femoral head which were resected at prosthetic replacement.