Pericardiophrenic artery

Last revised by David Luong on 14 Mar 2022

The pericardiophrenic artery, also known as the pericardiacophrenic artery, is a branch of the internal thoracic artery that runs to the diaphragm where it anastomoses with both the musculophrenic and superior phrenic arteries. It runs with the phrenic nerve and pericardiophrenic vein between the pleura and the pericardium, supplying the phrenic nervepericardium, anterior diaphragm and collateral blood supply to the heart. It must be noted that the pericardiophrenic artery collateral blood supply cannot independently sufficiently perfuse the myocardium and therefore cannot mitigate ischemia of the myocardium secondary to coronary artery pathology 3.

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