Carotid endarterectomy (CEA) and carotid artery stenting (CAS) are accepted revascularization modalities to treat carotid artery stenosis. Higher incidences of perioperative adverse neurological events and death have been reported in transfemoral CAS patients. Transcarotid artery revascularization (TCAR) is a newer operative technique that involves direct transcervical carotid access, mitigating aortic arch manipulation and minimizing the risk of embolic stroke via cerebral blood flow reversal. Perioperative stroke, myocardial infarction (MI), and death rates have been shown to be similar between TCAR and CEA, with TCAR having less complications. The objective of this study was to ascertain the safety and viability of TCAR by evaluating perioperative outcomes. We hypothesized that patients undergoing TCAR and CEA have equivalent outcomes.
We performed a single institution retrospective review of a prospectively maintained Vascular Quality Initiative database on patients who underwent TCAR or CEA between 2012 and 2019. A total of 66 TCAR cases from February 2018 to December 2019 and 501 CEA cases from January 2012 to December 2019 were reviewed. Preoperative, intraoperative, and postoperative characteristics as well as perioperative outcomes were captured for the statistical analyses.
From 2012 to 2019, 567 patients underwent TCAR or CEA. TCAR patients were found to have higher rates of comorbidities compared to CEA. There were no procedure-related strokes in patients that underwent TCAR. There was no statistically significant difference between TCAR and CEA procedure-related strokes (0% vs 1.0%, P = 0.42). There were five CEA procedure-related strokes due to technical problems resulting in thrombosis of the target vessels. Three CEA patients had strokes unrelated to the operations. Overall, there were no perioperative deaths, MI, cranial nerve injury (CNI), or hematoma in patients who underwent TCAR. There were no complications of surgical site infection, pseudoaneurysm, or arteriovenous fistula among TCAR or CEA patients.
This single-center retrospective analysis of TCAR and CEA for the treatment of carotid artery disease suggests TCAR can result in equivalent perioperative procedure-related stroke as CEA as well as equivalent incidence of perioperative complications including MI, CNI, hematoma, and death in selected patients or patients with proper anatomy. TCAR may be considered a safe, feasible carotid revascularization option for carotid artery stenosis.

Copyright © 2020. Published by Elsevier Inc.

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