Carotid artery resection and reconstruction for head and neck cancer

Patients with squamous cell carcinoma adherent to the carotid artery have a very poor prognosis, but some can be salvaged by aggressive surgical resection. From 1989 to 1997, eleven patients, ten males and one women, whose ages ranged from 40 to 69 years, with advanced cervical carcinomas, were treated at the Latvian Oncological Centre. En bloc resection of the tumor with artery and reconstruction with reversed saphenous vein was performed in all cases. One patient died from disruption of the arterial graft three days after operation, other died from sepsis seven days after operation. Three patients died five, ten and nineteen months after operation as a result of tumor recurrence. One patient was lost to be followed up in three years. Four are alive, twenty, ten, eight and six months after operation without evidence of tumor recurrence. In conclusion, carotid artery resection and reconstruction for advanced cervical carcinomas can be performed in selected cases.