Zentralblatt für Chirurgie
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Increasing life expectancy, medication and disease burden, along with decreased functional status and organ reserve, place the elderly surgical patient at high risk for delirium in the peri-operative state. Alcohol abuse and an increased incidence of dementia may confound the picture. This overview describes definition, epidemiology, etiology, diagnosis, and therapy of delirium and explores the confounding effects of dementia.
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Advances in early diagnosis of abdominal aortic abnormalities, enhanced pre-and post-surgical care and improved pharmacological treatment, as well as new interventional strategies and surgical techniques have led to a considerable increase of those patients, who undergo surgical therapy, either using classical trans-abdominal open or endovascular techniques. These patients, as a result of their often underlying multi-morbidity, are prone to secondary complications that often require individual solutions. We present and discuss two cases of post-surgical complications that required individual strategies for risk reduction. The first case demonstrates the endovascular approach to a complication following open aortic surgery, the second describes a surgical intervention to solve a problem following endovascular therapy.