Illustrated Encyclopedia of Human Anatomic Variation: Opus III: Nervous System
Ronald A. Bergman, PhD
Adel K. Afifi, MD, MS
Ryosuke Miyauchi, MD
Peer Review Status: Internally Peer Reviewed
"Description of individual dissections. For the convenience of the reader, the findings are presented in a schematic fashion, using the following conventions: (1) Sympathetic cardiac branches are shown as continuous dark lines. (2) Connections made by the sympathetic trunks or their cardiac rami with other nerves are indicated by interrupted lines. (3) Sympathetic rami to structures other than the heart are shown as continuous lines ending in small blobs. Many rami contain, in addition to cardiac elements, nerve fibers destined for other structures and this explains why, in some diagrams, a branch from a cardiac nerve is shown ending in a blob. (4) Points of special interest are denoted by asterisks, stars and arrows. Explanations of these symbols are given in the relevant descriptions.
Fetus 1. Both sympathetic trunks lack vertebral ganglia (i.e., ganglia in close relationship to the vertebral artery). On the right side, a distal intermediate ganglion (*) lies on the middle cervical cardiac ramus; the middle cervical ganglion being absent.
In addition to connections between cervical sympathetic cardiac rami and other nerves, thoracic branches from both trunks join together (arrow) before running to the heart . On the left side a nerve (*) has been traced to a plexus on the descending branch of the left coronary artery.
Fetus 2. There are no ganglia on the right sympathetic trunk between the superior cervical and cervicothoracic.
As in fetus 1. thoracic cardiac rami from the two sides join (arrow) and, in addition, a strand was traced from the left thoracic trunk to a plexus on the descending branch of the left coronary artery."
Variations continued in Figures 74-78.
From Ellison, J.P. and TH. Williams. Sympathetic nerve path, ways to the human heart, and their variations. Am. J. Anat. 124:149-162, 1969.
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