Anatomical Study of Human Cardiac Arteries

The blood supply of the heart is provided by the right and the left coronary arteries. The right coronary arises from the anterior aortic sinus and the left coronary arises from the left posterior aortic sinus of the ascending aorta. These arteries and their branches anastomose with each other but the anastomoses are not sufficiently large to maintain a collateral circulation. Variations of these branches do not have a determinable pattern, so this investigation was done to establishing and recognizing the variations of coronary arteries.This investigation was carried out on 40 adult human hearts of fixed Iranian male cadavers, with approximate age of 40-80 years. Dissecting tools used to remove the pericardium in order to expose the coronary arteries and their branches, for observing any kind of variations. The origin of both right and left coronary arteries had no variation.In 2 cases (5%), the right marginal artery was absent. The blood supply of the heart in 92.5% of cases was right dominant, but in only7.5% was left dominant. We observed that in 90% of cases the anterior interventricular artery ran on the diaphragmatic surface to anastomose with the posterior interventricular artery, in only two cases, the left marginal artery was absent, however in these cases the diagonal artery had more branches than the others.Variations of coronary arteries do exist, but they are generally asymptomatic, there is no official reference offered and no acceptable pattern of such variations presented either. In spite of the technological development in dissection and study of angiography and surgical myocardial revascularization, the variations of the coronary arteries must be taken under consideration.