Snare-assisted thoracic endovascular aortic repair for redirection of a false lumen elephant trunk.

In recent years, a hybrid approach to the classic two-stage elephant trunk technique has come into favor for treatment of thoracic aortic dissection. During the first stage, inadvertent intraoperative placement of the elephant trunk into the false lumen can occur on rare occasions, resulting in untoward difficulties during the second stage of the procedure. We describe here a snare-assisted technique for endovascular salvage of an elephant trunk that had inadvertently been placed in the false lumen of a chronic aortic dissection.