Morphometry of the aortic arch and its branches

Abstract Our study was conducted by the evaluation of angioCT’s performed on a GE LightSpeed VCT64 Slice CT Scanner. The measurements were performed on the aortic arch at the following levels: at the origin of the aorta, the middle part of the ascending aorta, prior to the origin of the brachiocephalic arterial trunk and after the origin of the left subclavian artery. We measured the caliber of the aortic arch arteries and the data are correlated and reported by gender. The diameter of the ascending aorta was between 27 to 28.9 mm in females and in males from 25.8 to 37.6 mm. The diameter of the aorta within the middle segment of the ascending part was between 28-30.2 mm in females and in males from 26.1 to 34.6. The diameter of the aortic arch prior to the origin of the brachiocephalic arterial trunk was between 26.4 to 29.4 mm in females and in males from 25.8 to 37.5 mm. The diameter of the aortic arch after the origin of the left subclavian artery was in a range of 20.4 to 28.4 mm, which corresponds to the limits found in males while in females the aortic diameter was between 21.3 to 24.1 mm. The brachiocephalic trunk diameters were 8.3 to 15.5 mm in females and in males was 9.1 to 14.5 mm. The right common carotid artery had a diameter of 4-8 mm diameter in males and in females ranged from 4.7 to 5.5 mm. The right subclavian artery showed a caliber of 5.7 to 7.5 mm in females and in males from 5.9 to 10.1. The left common carotid artery diameter was 4.6 to 5.7 mm in females and males the diameter was between 5.2 to 7.4 mm. The left subclavian artery had a diameter of 6-10 mm in females and in males ranged from 7.7 to 12.8 mm. We found that the distance between the ascending part of the aorta and the descending segment ranged from 33.3 to 38.5 mm in females and in males from 40 to 68.6 mm. We measured the distance that exists at the crossing of the aortic arch with the left branch of the pulmonary trunk, finding that in females this distance is 3 to 10.3 mm and in males from 3 to 12.5 mm.