The cephalic vein as an access route in intravenous digital subtraction angiography.

Abstract

Intravenous digital subtraction angiography (IV DSA) has come into widespread use within recent years. The contrast medium bolus was initially injected into an arm vein (Crummy et al, 1980) but because of concern over extravasation of contrast medium and in an effort to “tighten” the bolus, placement of a catheter into the vena cava or right atrium has become the most commonly used method today. Catheterisation of an antecubital fossa vein is usually preferred to the common femoral venous route in the performance of IV DSA, particularly in outpatients. The superficial venous anatomy at the antecubital fossa is variable. Obliquely directed veins may be the cephalic or basilic veins themselves or may be their tributaries, such as the median cubital, median basilic, or median cephalic veins. For purposes of simplification in this paper, any antecubital fossa vein coursing laterally will be considered a cephalic vein, and a medially directed vein, a basilic vein. Traditionally, catheterisation of the basilic ...