Rapid ventricular pacing to lower blood pressure during endograft deployment in the thoracic aorta.

Controlled hypotension is critical to the accurate deployment of aortic endografts and safe balloon post-dilation. We describe the use of rapid ventricular pacing during 15 aortic stenting procedures. An immediate and sustained reduction in both phasic and mean blood pressure was achieved in all patients. This procedure has advantages over pharmacologic or other methods of blood pressure reduction.