Abdominal aortic aneurysms: The quest for meaningful biomarkers and opportunities to improve surgical care

Abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) is a widening of the abdominal aorta that mostly occurs in the elderly. The first part of this thesis focused on the current value of imaging biomarkers of AAA progression. The markers included inflammatory and biomechanical biomarkers. In addition, new imaging biomarkers of AAA progression were developed and presented. The second part of this thesis investigated the clinical outcomes after AAA repair in order to find opportunities to improve surgical care. This second part mostly focused on surgical complications, and dealt with the prevention of incisional hernias, the diagnosis and consequences of bowel ischemia, and late outcomes of acute kidney injury following ruptured AAA repair. The third part presents new research infrastructures and methods that were developed to facilitate and enhance future AAA research. The design and the protocol of the newly established “Pearl AAA” biobank is presented in this third part.