Anatomical Variations and Clinical Significance of the Cerebral Arterial Circle in Turkish Cadavers

The structure formed by the arteries, which is of great importance in the irrigation of the brain, is called the cerebral arterial circle (Polygon of Willis). Since the cerebral arterial circle provides brain nutrition, vascularabnormalities in this region are highly relevant. Therefore, the aim of our study was to examine the variations of the cerebral arterial circle in cadavers of Turkish individuals. In our study, 32 human cadavers obtained from three different universities were retrospectively examined. Brain tissue obtained from cadavers by craniotomy was kept in 20 % formaldehyde solution for an average of 10 days for fixation. Cerebral arterial circle diagrams were determined in all cadavers by staining and photographs were taken. As a result of the brain examinations, a variation of the cerebral arterial circle was detected in 24/32 brains. Vascular variations have an important place in congenital variations. For this reason, we believe that our brain study will contribute to clinical studies on this topic by investigating variations of the cerebral arterial circle.