Doppler ultrasound evaluation of hemodialysis vascular access

Abstract EN

Brescia-Cimino arteriovenous fistulas (AVF) ad synthetic grafts are the usual forms of vascular accesses for hemodialysis.

Although angiography has been the traditional means of imaging these vascular systems, colour Doppler flow imaging (CDFI) offers a non-invasive method of evaluating AVF dysfunction.

We retrospectively evaluated 22 patients with clinical evidence of access dysfunction who were studied by CDFI and of whom 14 also underwent angiography.

We analyzed the results of whom the 14 patients who had both CDFI and angiography as angiography was impossible in the remaining eight patients due to difficulty with cannulation.

Eight patient had thrombosis on CDFI and angiopraphy in all eight patients confirmed these findings.

CDFI showed six stenoses, all of which were proven on angiopraphy.

Overall,, CDFI correctly identified all lesions that were seen angiographically ginging a sensitivity and specifificity of 100%.

Moreover, CDFI detected two cases of pseudoaneurysms which were missed by angiography.

CDFI provides an adequate means of evaluating AVF dysfunction and should be the initial imaging technique of choice.