Management of Giant Splenic Artery Aneurysm : Comprehensive Literature Review

Abstract

To provide an overview of the medical literature on giant splenic artery aneurysm (SAA).

The PubMed, Medline, Google Scholar, and Google databases were searched using keywords to identify articles related to SAA. Keywords used were splenic artery aneurysm, giant splenic artery aneuryms, huge splenic artery aneurysm, splenic artery aneurysm rupture, and visceral artery aneurysm. SAAs with a diameter ≥5 cm are considered as giant and included in this study. The language of the publication was not a limitation criterion, and publications dated before January 15, 2015 were considered.

The literature review included 69 papers (62 fulltext, 6 abstract, 1 nonavailable) on giant SAA. A sum of 78 patients (50 males, 28 females) involved in the study with an age range of 27–87 years (mean ± SD: 55.8 ± 14.0 years). Age range for male was 30–87 (mean ± SD: 57.5 ± 12.0 years) and for female was 27–84 (mean ± SD: 52.7 ± 16.6 years). Most frequent predisposing factors were acute or chronic pancreatitis, atherosclerosis, hypertension, and cirrhosis. Aneurysm dimensions were obtained for 77 patients with a range of 50–300 mm (mean ± SD: 97.1 ± 46.0 mm). Aneurysm dimension range for females was 50–210 mm (mean ± SD: 97.5 ± 40.2 mm) and for males was 50–300 mm (mean ± SD: 96.9 ± 48.9 mm). Intraperitoneal/retroperitoneal rupture was present in 15, among which with a lesion dimension range of 50–180 mm (mean ± SD; 100 ± 49.3 mm) which was range of 50–300 mm (mean ± SD: 96.3 ± 45.2 mm) in cases without rupture. Mortality for rupture patients was 33.3%. Other frequent complications were gastrosplenic fistula (n = 3), colosplenic fistula (n = 1), pancreatic fistula (n = 1), splenic arteriovenous fistula (n = 3), and portosplenic fistula (n = 1). Eight of the patients died in early postoperative period while 67 survived. Survival status of the remaining 3 patients is unclear. Range of follow-up period for the surviving patients varies from 3 weeks to 42 months.

Either rupture or fistulization into hollow organs risk increase in compliance with aneurysm diameter. Mortality is significantly high in rupture cases. Patients with an evident risk should undergo either surgical or interventional radiological treatment without delay.