Abstract
Portal collateral pathways were evaluated on the clearly opacified endoscopic varicer-ograms (EV), obtained in the endoscopic embolization on 126 patients with esophageal varices from October 1981 to September 1985. Examinations of EV identified the blood supply route to esophageal varices through the left gastric vein, the fundic venous plexus and the short gastric vein, and the blood outlet route besides esophageal varices (the extraesophageal shunt). Frequency of visualization for each collateral pathway was 52.4% for the left gastric vein, 47.6% for the fundic venous plexus, 8.7% for the short gastric vein, and 14.3% for the extraesophageal shunt. According to our results, we believe that in the endoscopic embolization, a necessary injection dose must be established according to the volume of these visualized blood routes.
