Bifurcation of axillary artery – an unusual case

A male cadaver (approximately 60 years old) was seen to have a variant pattern of axillary artery branching.

On the right side, the axillary artery bifurcated behind the pectoralis minor into two trunks – superficial and deep. The median nerve was formed by the union of the two roots between these trunks. The deep trunk trifurcated in the upper arm into subscapular, a common trunk which gave origin to anterior and posteror circumflex humeral arteries, a branch that ran distally that gave rise to profunda brachii artery. The superficial trunk continued as the brachial artery and it bifurcated at the level of head of radius into radial and ulnar arteries.

On the left side, the axillary artery branching pattern was as usual.

The implication of this study occurs in various streams especially vascular surgery, general surgery, as well as in radiodiagnosis in Doppler and contrast imaging of vessels.