Papua New Guinea Journal of Science, Technology & Engineering

William Mol, Satoru Sasaki, Hiroshi Furukawa, Yuhei Yamamoto

Hokkaido University Graduate School of Medicine, Department of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, Sapporo, Japan

Kita-15, Nishi-7, Kita-ku, Sapporo, Hokkaido, 060-8638, Japan, Tel: 81-11-706-6978, Fax: 81-11-706-7827 or E-mail: yu-h1@med.hokudai.ac.jp

ABSTRACT

 In the past the treatment for vascular malformation used to be mainly surgery. However, surgery poses the problems of bleeding and poor aesthetic outcomes. Sclerotherapy is an old therapeutic method that has been re-visited and popularized recently. Percutaneous and transcatheteric sclerotherapy are 2 methods of sclerotherapy that are employed. This paper presents assessment of patients undergoing only percutaneous sclerotherapy for vascular malformations at the Graduate School of Medicine, Hokkaido University.The sclerosants used were absolute ethanol and 1 % polidocanol. Comparison between 2 sclerosants and among the different types of vascular malformations was performed. The major outcome category for each lesion types were; arteriovenous malformation, 35 % good, venous malformation 47 % good, macrocystic lymphatic malformation, 88 % excellent, microcystic lymphatic malformation 64 % good and capillary malformation 67 % fair. The rate of major complications was 1.7%. It was established that Absolute Ethanol is more effective than 1 % polidocanol. However, it is associated with more local complications compared with 1 % polidocanol. The outcome for low flow, single cavity lesions are much better than for high flow lesions and multi-cystic lesions. This paper recommends that polidocanol is useful for small, low flow, superficial lesions while absolute ethanol is useful for large and deep lesions as well as both low and high flow lesions.  

Key words: hemangioma, vascular malformation, percutaneous, transcatheteric, sclerotherapy, absolute ethanol, 1% polidocanol.