Normal, accessory, and aberrant branches of the common iliac artery: angiographic prevalence and clinical implications.

Purpose: Catheter angiography remains essential to detect, characterize, and treat many vascular, traumatic, and neoplastic conditions affecting the pelvis, but the angiographic literature rarely mentions the common iliac artery (CIA) and its branches. The "normal" branches of the CIA principally consist of subangiographic rami supplying neighboring structures. Larger branches participate in the vascularization of the psoas muscle and the ureter. Less often, the CIA provides anomalous branches that complement or replace critical neighboring vessels. This study investigates the prevalence, type, and clinical relevance of CIA branches detectable during pelvic angiography.

Methods: This study analyzes the prevalence of CIA branches in 100 consecutive angiograms that included bilateral CIA injections as well as selective catheterizations of the median sacral artery, both L4 ISAs, and both internal iliac arteries. CIA branches were classified as normal (i.e., neither supplementing nor replacing a normal artery), accessory (i.e., supplementing a normal artery), or aberrant (i.e., replacing a normal artery).

Results: Forty-three branches arose from 38 CIAs (19% of CIAs) in 30 patients (30% of patients), including 20 normal branches (46.5%), 21 aberrant branches (48.8%), and 2 accessory branches (4.7%). Each of the 15 patients with aberrant branches had at least one anomalous vessel capable of providing a radicular or radiculomedullary artery.

Conclusions: CIA branches were present in 30% of patients undergoing spinal angiography. While most normal branches were diminutive and clinically irrelevant, CIAs also provided vessels able to vascularize pelvic and vertebral structures, including the spinal cord or a spinal vascular malformation in 16% of cases. Our study therefore confirms that CIA injections represent an essential component of pelvic and spinal angiography.