Cephalic veins in coronary artery bypass surgery.

Various alternative conduits for aortocoronary bypass grafting have been suggested when the saphenous vein quality is inadequate. During a 10-year period we have used the cephalic vein in 39 patients. Eighteen entered an angiographic follow-up study. A total of 31 arm vein grafts were used with 43 distal anastomoses. When calculating patency by number of patent distal anastomoses, this was 46% (median follow-up was 31 months), but calculating by the number of patent grafts we found 52% patency (median follow-up 31 months). In conclusion, we discourage others from using arm veins in aortocoronary bypass operations.