Surgically important accessory hepatic artery - A case report

Variations in the origin and branching pattern of the hepatic artery are common. The knowledge of its variations is of importance to the radiologists and surgeons. We report here, the presence of an accessory hepatic artery. The accessory hepatic artery took its origin from the superior mesenteric artery, passed behind the head of the pancreas, first part of duodenum and reached the porta hepatis through the lesser omentum. In the lesser omentum the artery was posterior to the portal vein. The celiac trunk terminated by dividing into common hepatic, splenic, left gastric and left inferior phrenic arteries. The caudate lobe of the liver was abnormally large.