ELI5- I am looking at report from an angiogram. It specifically states: “Anomalous origin of the left sided coronary arteries from the right coronary cusp.”
This is from an elderly patient. I understand how the heart works. I understand the literature I have read about anomalous origins of different parts of the heart. I cannot find anything about this in particular. (I am not a doctor.) Can someone explain to me what this means and what the effect of it would be?
In: 1
Its an interesting variant.
The heart itself requires blood. And it has its own arteries and veins. (note these are not the great vessels that we usually associate with the heart). The normal anatomy is 2 Left sided arteries and 1 right sided artery. The left heart arteries should originate from the left coronary cusp. The right artery from the right.
In this vairiant, the arteries are all originating from the same place (the right)
This is most likely a congenital defect. So your elderly person has done pretty well with it having lived with it their whole life so far. Could it be harmful? maybe. If the right side gets blocked, most of the time people will be ok (albeit sick). If the right side gets blocked in your elderly person, then they might lose all blood supply to the heart resulting in a massive and likely non-survivable heart attack.
I found this:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7243662/#__ffn_sectitle
It says that weirdly shaped arteries can become obstructed. No or lacking blood flow can be fatal.
>Conclusions
>Despite stenosis being non-significant in the coronary arteries per se, CABG [coronary artery bypass grafting] was required in all three of our patients. It’s possible that the compression of LMCA between the aorta and pulmonary artery may have led to their presentation. LMCA from the right sinus of Valsalva is thus a rare but often fatal anomaly. Due to a lack of data and inability to predict the risk of sudden cardiac death, major society guidelines recommend surgical intervention (class 1 recommendation) for all patients regardless of ischemia or symptoms.
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