A natural or artificial communication between 2 blood vessels or tubular cavities that may or may not normally be joined. Natural anastomoses usually occur when small arteries are attached directly to veins without passing through capillaries. They occur in the skin and are used to help control temperature regulation. Surgical anastomoses are used to create a bypass around a blockage in an artery or in the intestine. They are also used to rejoin cut ends of the bowel or blood vessels.
(See also bypass surgery.)
Direct intercommunication of the branches of two or more veins or arteries without any intervening network of capillary vessels. The term also describes the surgical joining of two hollow blood vessels, nerves or organs such as intestines to form an intercommunication.
n. 1. (in anatomy) a communication between two blood vessels without an intervening capillary network. See arteriovenous anastomosis. 2. (in surgery) the surgical joining of two hollow organs, such as different parts of the intestines or blood vessels, in order to bypass disease or resected tissue and to restore continuity of the affected organ. See also shunt.
a thick-walled blood vessel that connects an arteriole directly with a venule, thus bypassing the capillaries. Arteriovenous anastomoses are commonly found in the skin of the lips, nose, ears, hands and feet; their muscular walls can constrict to reduce blood flow or dilate to allow blood through to these areas.... arteriovenous anastomosis
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