One of the most urgent vascular circumstances: Acute limb ischemia

• Main Authors: Rezzan D Acar, Muslum Sahin, Cevat Kirma
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: SAGE Publishing 2013-12-01
• Series: SAGE Open Medicine
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.1177/2050312113516110

Acute limb ischemia is a sudden decrease in limb perfusion that threatens limb viability and requires urgent evaluation and management. Most of the causes of acute limb ischemia are thrombosis of a limb artery or bypass graft, embolism from the heart or a disease artery, dissection, and trauma. Assessment determines whether the limb is viable or irreversibly damaged. Prompt diagnosis and revascularization by means of catheter-based thrombolysis or thrombectomy and by surgery reduce the risk of limb loss and mortality. Amputation is performed in patients with irreversible damage. Despite urgent revascularization, amputation rate is 10%–15% in patients during hospitalization, mostly above the knee, and mortality within 1 year is 10%–15% due to the coexisting conditions.