Vessel harvesting

Vessel harvesting is a surgical technique that may be used in conjunction with a coronary artery bypass graft (CABG). For patients with coronary artery disease, a vascular bypass may be recommended to reroute blood around blocked arteries to restore and improve blood flow and oxygen to the heart. To create the bypass graft, a surgeon will remove or "harvest" healthy blood vessels from another part of the body, either arteries from an arm or the chest, or veins from a leg.^[1] This vessel becomes a graft, with one end attaching to a blood source above and the other end below the blocked area, creating a "conduit" channel or new blood flow connection across the heart.

The success of a coronary artery bypass graft may be influenced by the quality of the conduit and how it is handled or treated during the vessel harvest and preparation steps prior to grafting.

Success can be measured in terms of:

• The need for repeat revascularization to treat a new blockage
• Morbidity
• Mortality (minimal)