The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of the modified extracorporeal circulation perfusion method during surgery for acute Stanford type A aortic dissection in patients who underwent stented elephant trunk implantation and arch replacement.

A total of 69 patients with acute Stanford type A aortic dissection who underwent stented elephant trunk implantation and arch replacement were retrospectively analysed from 2017 to 2018. According to the perfusion method of extracorporeal circulation, patients were divided into a routine perfusion (RP) group and a modified perfusion (MP) group. Clinical data were collected, including the time of extracorporeal circulation and deep hypothermic circulatory arrest, incidence of acute kidney injury and neurological complications, and comparisons between the two groups were conducted by using independent sample t-tests for normally distributed qualitative data, the Mann–Whitney U-test for skewed qualitative data, and the chi square test or Fisher’s exact test for categorical data.

There were 55 (80%) males and 14 (20%) females in the entire cohort, and the mean ± standard deviation age was 50.4±9.0 years. A total of 53 (77%) patients were included in the RP group, and 16 (23%) were included in the MP group. Patients in the MP group were older (55.5±7.8 vs 48.8±8.9 years), and the difference was significant (p=0.008). Compared with the RP group, the time of extracorporeal circulation (218.0 [44.7] vs 246.0 [58.0] min; p=0.005) and deep hypothermic circulatory arrest (4.0 [2.0] vs 25.0 [10.0] min; p<0.001) was shorter, and the incidence of postoperative acute kidney injury (n=6 [37.5%] vs n=36 [67.9%]; p=0.029) was lower in the MP group; the differences were significant. Six (6) patients died in the RP group; no patients died in the MP group. The total in-hospital mortality rate was 8.7%.

The modified extracorporeal circulation perfusion method is feasible, with satisfactory results.