Matt Breen, Reporting, "Dr. Artang you often hear about a friend or family member who is told they have an aneurysm? What is aneurysm and is it a dangerous condition?"
Dr. Ramin Artang, Mercy Cardiology says, "Aneurysm is a condition where the wall of a vessel is wider that what is supposed to be. Most of the time when people hear about aneurysm it is regarding our major artery that supplies blood to the entire body the AORTA. There is another more rare condition with a similar name that is brain aneurysm. These patients have these widened vessels in their brain is stead of Aorta. The most common condition is known as Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm also kwon as Triple AAA."
Matt Breen, Reporting, "What is so dangerous about this condition?"
Dr. Ramin Artang, Mercy Cardiology says "Lets talk about the aortic aneurysm first. Aorta is a big and long vessel. The aneurysm can happen either in the beginning, middle or end of aorta. Regardless of the location, once its gets bigger than a certain size, usually twice as big as normal, then there will be high likelihood that is might burst, or what we call a rupture, that means because of increased tension, a tear may occur in the vessel wall, and when you are dealing with a big vessel with lots of bloods and high pressure, the condition can get ugly very quickly and patients my bleed internally and if there is no medical attention within minutes after this happen, they may not survive this event."
Matt Breen, Reporting, "This sounds pretty dramatic and dangerous, how do we deal with it?"
Dr. Ramin Artang, Mercy Cardiology says "Well in real life it happens occasionally but not as common as heart attack or stroke. The most important thing is not to allow the aneurysm to get this big. Once a patient is diagnosed with this condition they need to have frequent studies where we major the size of aorta on a regular basis like every 6 months or every year. We can see if the aorta is getting bigger with time, and there are guidelines for when to go ahead and fix it before it is too late. It is based on the measurement crosses a certain threshold where we know the risk of rupture would be significantly increased, or the aorta is growing to fast with each measurement even if it hasn't reached the threshold we will still go ahead and fix it."
Matt Breen, Reporting, "How do you treat that?"
Dr. Ramin Artang, Mercy Cardiology says "It is really depends on where it is. There are certain types of aneurysms where treatment may be more dangerous than not treating. So there is certain way we approach it and based on the location we decide whether to treat surgically or leave it alone to medical treatment with intensive blood pressure control. If we decide to treat the options are open surgery or endograft stenting. Again each method has its advantage and disadvantage so we need to look at the patient and make a decision that makes sense both technically and suited for the patient. I am going to show a picture from a patient of main that was treated in December of last year."
Matt Breen, Reporting, "Who is at risk of this disease?"
Dr. Ramin Artang, Mercy Cardiology says "As we previously have mentioned the same problems for most cardiovascular disease, including smoking, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, family history of aortic aneurysm, and certain genetic disorder known as marfan's disease."
