Cardiomed coronary flow meter for prevention of early occlusion in aortocoronary bypass grafting.

Introduction: The number of patients undergoing technically demanding off-pump myocardial revascularization is increasing, these days. Some researchers question the quality of the aortocoronary bypasses done on the beating heart and consequently their good patency.

Material And Methods: 50 consecutive patients underwent off pump coronary surgery using sequential bypass technique, at our department. The quality of constructed grafts was evaluated using the CardioMed Trace System (CM4008, Medi-Stim As, Oslo, Norway) (TTFM).

Results: All sequential bypasses showed good per-operative quality with a mean fl ow of 69.4 ml/min.

Conclusion: TTFM seems to be an effective tool for the per-operative aortocoronary bypass patency verification and should help to prevent early graft occlusion.

Abbreviations: TTFM transit time flow meter.