Abstract
Acute limb ischemia (ALI) is a predictor of high morbidity and mortality. Previous
studies showed that ALI developed after cardiac surgery may increase mortality.
This study aimed to elucidate the clinical course and identify risk factors contributing
to mortality in patients with ALI after cardiovascular surgery.
This is a single-center retrospective cohort study. We analyzed data from 52 patients
with ALI after cardiovascular surgery between 2016 and 2020. We evaluated the risk
factors for 1-year mortality using Cox proportional hazards regression analysis.
Most of the patients with ALI were male and the median age was 56 years (23–72 years).
Most of the patients with ALI had coronary artery diseases. The 1-year mortality rate
was 55.8% (n = 29 patients). Multivariable analysis revealed that cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB)
time ≥ 100 minutes (hazard ratio [HR]: 3.067, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.158–8.120)
and postoperative acute kidney injury (HR: 2.927, 95% CI: 1.358–6.305) were significantly
increasing the risk of mortality in patients with ALI after an operation. ALI after
cardiovascular surgery was associated with high 1-year mortality in our study and
long CPB time and postoperative acute kidney injury contributed to the mortality.
Keywords
acute limb ischemia - cardiovascular surgery - mortality
