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As endovascular approaches to thoracoabdominal aortic repairs continue to evolve, careful assessment of the safety and efficacy of these alternative approaches will require comparison with standard open surgical repair. The purpose of this report is to update our experience with conventional open repair of thoracoabdominal aortic aneurysms.

Since 1986, 2286 patients have undergone open repair of thoracoabdominal aortic aneurysms on our service. Of these, 1662 patients (72.7%) had degenerative aneurysms without dissection, 78 (3.4%) had acute aortic dissection, and 546 (23.9%) had chronic dissection. There were 139 ruptured aneurysms (6.1%). Extensive repairs (ie, Crawford extents I and II) were performed in 1468 patients (64.2%). Segmental intercostal or lumbar arteries were reattached in 1401 patients (61.3%), left heart bypass was used in 909 (39.8%), and …