Contemporary open surgical approaches for the management of carotid stenosis: a comprehensive review.

Abstract

This study aims to provide an overview on contemporary open surgical approaches for the management of carotid artery stenosis. A comprehensive literature search was performed to identify and categorize open surgery intervention techniques for the management of carotid artery stenosis, focusing on the benefits and drawbacks of each technique. Five surgical techniques for carotid endarterectomy (CEA) have been described: CEA with primary closure, CEA with patch closure, CEA by eversion technique, CEA by modified eversion technique and CEA by partial eversion. Evidence has reported significantly higher rates of perioperative complications after CEA with primary closure, including 30-days stroke rate and late restenosis. Although more recent techniques have been reported to provide superior outcomes, electing the best surgical technique is still a matter of debate. Also, CEA using a mini-skin incision has been associated to lower risk of cranial/cervical nerve injury and shorter length of hospital stay. The selection of the surgical intervention should be tailored and have into consideration individual patient characteristics, clinical considerations, surgeon preference and surgical team expertise. Further large-scale randomized clinical trials are needed to support more robust decisions on the choice of contemporary open surgical approaches to manage carotid stenosis.