The Therapeutic Strategies Including Surgery for Popliteal Venous Aneurysms

Popliteal venous aneurysm (PVA) is a rare disease that often causes a fatal pulmonary embolism (PE). Herein, we report 5 cases of PVAs. All cases are complicated with pulmonary embolism and all PVAs were not diagnosed before the PE attack. The size of PVAs varies, but all PVAs had thrombus which resulted in PE. We treated PVAs with not only anticoagulation therapy but surgery that was tailored for the types of venous aneurysms. All reconstructed popliteal veins have been patent postoperatively and no further PE was found in the distant period. Although there is no guideline on the therapeutic strategy for PVA, some reviews of the literature showed a strategy based on the symptoms and the shape and the size of PVAs. In this report, we presented 5 cases of PVA and reviewed its therapeutic strategies nowadays.