Profunda femoris artery

Artery: Profunda femoris artery
The profunda femoris artery, femoral artery and their major branches - right thigh, anterior view. (Femoral profunda labeled at right center.)
Structures surrounding right hip-joint. (Femoral profunda not labeled, but is visible near center right.)
Latin	arteria profunda femoris
Gray's	subject #157 629
Source	femoral artery
Branches	Lateral femoral circumflex Medial femoral circumflex Perforating
Vein	profunda femoris vein

The profunda femoris artery (also known as the deep femoral artery, or the deep artery of the thigh) is a branch of the femoral artery that, as its name suggests, travels more deeply (posteriorly) than the rest of the femoral artery.

Structure

The profunda femoris branches off the femoral artery soon after its origin. It travels down the thigh closer to the femur than the femoral artery, running between the pectineus and the adductor longus, and running on the posterior side of adductor longus. The deep femoral artery does not leave the thigh.

Branches

The profunda femoris gives off the following branches:

• Lateral femoral circumflex artery
• Medial femoral circumflex artery
• Perforating arteries - perforate the adductor magnus muscle to the posterior and medial compartments of the thigh.

Additional images

• 

  Cross-section through the middle of the thigh.

• 

  A schema of the arteries of the thigh. The profunda femoris artery is labeled as "deep artery of the thigh" at the center left.

See also

• Femoral artery
• Obturator artery

External links

• Duke Orthopedics profunda_femoris_deep_femoral_artery
• SUNY Figs 12:04-03 - "Arteries of the lower extremity shown in association with major landmarks."
• Cross section at UV pelvis/pelvis-e12-15
• MedEd at Loyola grossanatomy/dissector/labs/le/ant_th_leg/main.html
• antthigh at The Anatomy Lesson by Wesley Norman (Georgetown University) (femoralart)

This article was originally based on an entry from a public domain edition of Gray's Anatomy. As such, some of the information contained within it may be outdated.