G. Patrick Clagett

Clagett is closely associated with treating infected aortic prosthetic grafts and reconstructing major blood vessels. His work helped establish an operation that replaces infected synthetic material with the patient's own deep veins.

NAIS means neo-aortoiliac system and uses femoral-popliteal veins to reconstruct the aorta and iliac circulation after an infected graft is removed. Clagett published influential work on this approach in the early 1990s.

Autologous vein tissue can be more resistant to persistent infection than prosthetic material in a contaminated surgical field. The tradeoff is a technically demanding operation that requires harvesting substantial deep vein segments.

He became strongly associated with the vascular surgery program at UT Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas. His research covered aortic disease, graft infection, thrombosis, and vascular reconstruction.