Department of Surgery, Baragwanath Hospital, Johannesburg, South Africa.
A study was made of 76 patients with subclavian vessel injury. The mechanism of trauma was stabbing in 40 patients (53 per cent) and gunshot in 36 (47 per cent). There were marked differences between the two groups in clinical presentation, operative management and outcome. The group with gunshot injury was characterized by a more immediate threat to life, and a greater need for a median sternotomy and use of interposition grafts. The mortality rate in patients with gunshot wounds was more than twice that in the group with stab injury.