Coronary Artery Bypass Surgery

During a coronary artery bypass, the diseased sections of your coronary arteries are bypassed with healthy artery or vein grafts to increase blood flow to the heart muscle tissue. This procedure is also called coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG). Bypass typically requires open-chest surgery.

There are several newer, less invasive techniques for bypass surgery that can be used instead of open-chest surgery in some cases. In some procedures, the heart is slowed with medicine but is still beating during the procedure. For these types of surgery, a heart-lung bypass machine is not needed. (For open-chest surgery, a heart-lung machine is needed to circulate the blood and to add oxygen to it.) Other techniques use keyhole procedures or Reference minimally invasive procedures instead of open-chest surgery. Keyhole procedures use several smaller openings in the chest and may or may not require a heart-lung machine. These techniques are still being studied and may not be available in all medical centers.

The material in this section will focus on traditional open-chest bypass surgery. View the Reference slideshow on CABG surgery Opens New Window Reference Opens New Window to see what happens during a bypass.

You'll receive Reference anesthesia Opens New Window before the surgery that will make you sleep. In most cases, bypass surgery is open-chest surgery. During the surgery, your chest will be open and your heart exposed. The surgeon makes a large cut, or incision, in the middle or side of your chest. He or she may cut through your breastbone and spread apart your rib cage.

The surgeon removes a healthy blood vessel—often from the leg—and attaches (grafts) it to the blocked artery. The new blood vessel bypasses the blocked artery to increase blood flow to the heart. You may need just one bypass graft, or you may need more. Some people have as many as two, three, or even four (double, triple, or quadruple bypass surgery). How many grafts you need depends on how many arteries are blocked and where.

When the surgery is complete, the doctor may use wire to put your rib cage back together and stitches to close the incision. The surgery can take 3 to 6 hours. You will stay in the hospital at least 3 to 8 days after the surgery. It can take 4 to 6 weeks to recover at home. Most people are able to return to work within 1 to 2 months after surgery.

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