Anatomical considerations on the origin and termination of the abdominal aorta

Abstract

Introduction. Determination of anatomical characteristics of the AA at its origin, at the level of some collateral branches and at its terminal bifurcation. Material and methods Our study was performed on a number of 358 cases, using as methods: dissection, injection of plastic masses followed by dissection or corrosion, analysis of Doppler ultrasounds, MRIs, simple angiographies and angioCTs. Results We found the origin of AA, most frequently, at the level of the T11 vertebra. The transverse aortic diameter at the level of AA origin was from 14.4 to 29.6 mm. The aortic diameter at CT origin varied from 9.3 to 27.6 mm, at SMA origin from 8.7 to 27.2 mm, at RrAa origin from 9.3 to 26.3 mm and at IMA origin from 6.7 to 25.6 mm. The diameter above the terminal bifurcation of AA ranged between 5-19 mm. The external distance between the aortic origins of CT and SMA was from 0.6 to 35.8 mm and between the aortic origins of SMA and IMA from 40.4 to 115.2 mm. Terminal branching of aorta occurs between the L3-L4 intervertebral disc and the upper 1/3 of L5 vertebra. We found a length of 127.7-171.4 mm for AA in males and 111.4-166.0 mm in females. Conclusions The differences with the literature data are probably due to the number of cases studied and factors related to the geographical area in which the study was performed.