Supernumerary coronary artery. Case report

Abstract

During the routine dissection of a 60‐year‐old male within our university's Department of Anatomy, we identified a peculiar aspect of the coronary blood supply.The heart is normally supplied by two coronary arteries, however in our case, we identified a supernumerary coronary artery. It arose from the aorta, through a separate ostium, anterior of the right coronary artery's point of origin. This third artery descended diagonally along the anterior surface of the right ventricle. At the heart's apex, it then continued for approximately 2cm along the posterior interventricular sulcus.The right marginal branch took a diagonal descending path to the middle of the posterior interventricular sulcus, close to the terminal point of the third artery. At the same time, the right coronary artery was shortened, and only descended to the first third of the posterior interventricular sulcus.The left coronary artery presented with two branches: the circumflex branch, and a common trunk for the anterior interventricular branch and the left marginal branch. The anterior interventricular branch was shortened, only descending two thirds of the way along the anterior interventricular sulcus. Both it and the left marginal branch were partially covered by myocardial bridges. The circumflex branch terminated near the posterior interventricular sulcus through two ventricular branches.The study and knowledge of coronary variants is critical in identifying potential collateral paths, of which a supernumerary coronary artery is a good example.This abstract is from the Experimental Biology 2019 Meeting. There is no full text article associated with this abstract published in The FASEB Journal.