A 55-year-old man suffers from an acute myocardial infarction after occlusion of the left anterior descending coronary artery. The patient undergoes coronary bypass surgery 3 days later. Which of the following is the most frequent cause of saphenous vein graft failure several years following coronary bypass surgery?
Acute inflammation
Atherosclerosis
Graft-versus-host disease
Metastatic calcification
Saphenous veins are used as autografts in coronary artery bypass surgery. These grafts usually undergo a series of adaptive and reparative changes. Venous grafts in place for 5 to 10 years typically show atherosclerotic plaques that are indistinguishable from those found in native coronary arteries, a process referred to as atherosclerotic "restenosis."Diagnosis: Atherosclerosis
Blood Vessels