Acute vascular complications of femoral veno-arterial ECMO: a single-centre retrospective study

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Femoral arterial cannulation to initiate veno-arterial ECMO may result in ipsilateral limb ischemia due to reduced distal blood flow below the insertion point of the cannula. We retrospectively studied adult patients supported with femoral VA-ECMO for cardiogenic shock between 2015 and 2019 at our tertiary care hospital. RESULTS: . Twenty-one (32.3%) patients developed acute lower limb ischemia. The patients who developed acute limb ischemia had significantly frequent AKI (< 0.001) without significant use of haemodialysis (p = 0.07) and longer ICU stay (p = 0.028) compared to the patients without limb ischemia. The hospital mortality occurred in 29 (44.6%) patients without significant difference between the patients with and without acute limb ischemia. The occurrence of acute limb ischemia was significantly correlated with failed percutaneous cannulation (p = 0.039), while there was no significant statistical correlation between the cut-down technique and occurrence of limb ischemia (p = 0.053). The occurrence of femoral cannulation site bleeding was significantly correlated with failed percutaneous cannulation (p = 0.001) and cut-down technique (p = 0.001). CONCLUSION: Acute vascular complications are frequent after femoral VA-ECMO. Failed percutaneous femoral cannulation has been, in this study, identified as the most important risk factor for acute limb ischemia and cannulation site bleeding. A careful approach during femoral cannulation is recommended to prevent occurrence of acute limb ischemia and femoral cannulation site bleeding.