What is AV Fistula?
An abnormal connection between an artery and a vein is known an arteriovenous (AV) fistula. Normally what happens is, from your arteries blood flows to your capillaries to your veins. In your blood Nutrients and oxygen travel from your capillaries to tissues in your body.
Blood flows directly from an artery into a vein, bypassing some capillaries with an arteriovenous fistula. Tissues below the bypassed capillaries receive a diminished blood supply when this happens.
Arteriovenous fistulas usually occur in the legs, but can develop anywhere in the body. Arteriovenous fistulas are often surgically created for use in dialysis in people with severe kidney disease.
A large untreated arteriovenous fistula might even lead to very serious complications
In your legs, arms, lungs, kidneys or brain small arteriovenous fistulas often do not have any kind of signs or symptoms and they generally don’t need treatment other than monitoring by any doctor.
Large arteriovenous fistulas are responsible for causing signs and symptoms.
Sign and Symptoms of Arteriovenous fistula
Arteriovenous fistula signs and symptoms might include:
- A person is able to see Purplish, bulging veins through their skin, and they are very similar to varicose veins
- There is a swelling in the arms or legs
- Blood pressure starts to decrease
- A person often feels fatigued
- There are high chances of heart failure
In a person’s lungs an arteriovenous fistula and pulmonary arteriovenous fistula becomes a serious condition and might cause:
- There is a bluish tinge to the skin
- Fingers start to compress
- A person starts coughing up blood
Fistula in gastrointestinal tract an arteriovenous can cause bleeding in your digestive tract.
Causes of Arteriovenous fistula
Causes of arteriovenous fistulas are:
- Cardiac catheterization. An arteriovenous fistula might develop as a complication of a procedure which is known by the name as cardiac catheterization. A long, thin tube called a catheter has to be inserted in an artery or vein in the person’s groin, neck or arm and threaded through the blood vessels to the heart during cardiac catheterization.
If the needle which is being used in the catheterization indeed crosses an artery and vein during the procedure, and the artery gets widened or dilated, this leads to an arteriovenous fistula. This happens very rarely.
- Injuries piercing the skin. There is also a possibility of develop an arteriovenous fistula after a piercing injury, like gunshot or stab wound. This might happen if the wound is on a part of your body around a vein or an artery are side by side.
Being born with an arteriovenous fistula. When a person is born with an arteriovenous fistula (congenital). Even though the exact reason hasn’t been clear, in congenital arteriovenous fistulas the arteries and veins do not develop properly inside the womb.
- Genetic conditions. In the lungs Arteriovenous fistulas (pulmonary arteriovenous fistulas) might be caused by a genetic disease which is responsible for causing blood vessels in developing abnormally throughout your body, but specifically in the lungs.
- Surgical creation (AV fistula procedure). People who have started to suffer from late-stage kidney failure might have an arteriovenous fistula surgically created in order to make it easier in performing dialysis. If a dialysis needle has been inserted inside a vein a lot of times, the vein might scar and might even get destroyed. For surgical intervention of vascular malformations include the following indications:
- Hemorrhage
- Painful ischemia
- Congestive heart failure
- Nonhealing ulcers
- Functional impairment
- Limb-length inequality
