Anatomic variants of the splenic artery

Abstract

Introduction: the splenic artery is one of the three of the celiac trunk that irrigates spleen and emits branches to the stomach and the pancreas.
Objective: to determine the morphologic characteristics of the splenic artery.
Materials and Methods: a descriptive, observational, prospective, longitudinal and quantitative study was carried out in 26 tissue samples without abdominal surgeries nor hematologic diseases in the Teaching Provincial Hospital “Celia Sánchez Manduley” of Manzanillo, Granma. The samples were washed, fixed and dissected using the direct macroscopic method.
Results: the splenic artery originated, mostly, in the celiac trunk (88.46 %), its itinerary was tortuous in 84.62 % of the samples, linking before the splenic vein (80.77 %). Collateral branches were more frequent in the pancreatic segment (54.96 %). Short gastric arteries were the mostly emitted collateral branches (100 %). The average longitude of the splenic artery was 14.7 cm and its average diameter 0.86 cm. The number of terminal arteries showed an average of 6.04 while the short gastric arteries were emitted in an average of 4.76.
Conclusions: the splenic artery has a low anatomic variability pattern according to its origin and itinerary, but its relations, ending form and collateral branches show big variants from the anatomic norm.