Human anatomy; Heart; Dissection; Coronary Circulation.

Cardiac blood supply is carried out heterogeneously by the right and left coronary arteries. The anatomical distribution of these arteries and their branches determine what has been called coronary dominance, and is directly linked to the physiological arrangement. Schlessinger (1940) introduced the concept of coronary dominance and classified hearts as right, left, or balanced dominance depending on the position of the coronary arteries and their branches in relation to the crux cordis, on the diaphragmatic face of the heart [SCHLESINGER, M. J. Relation of the anatomical pattern to pathologic conditions of the coronary arteries. Arch. Pathol., 30: 403-415, 1940]. However, Falci Jr and co-workers (1994) proposed an alteration in this concept aiming to approximate the anatomical and physiological dominance [FALCI JÚNIOR, R. et al. Anatomia das artérias coronárias. Rev. Med., 72(1):21-24, 1994]. The determination of the dominant pattern is correlated with heart diseases, with the left having the greatest range of associated diseases. The present study aimed to verify coronary dominance in human hearts from a population in Rio Grande do Norte. For this, 170 hearts from adult cadavers fixed in 10% formaldehyde from the Human Anatomy Laboratory of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte were dissected, had their coronaries exposed, and were classified as right, balanced, or left dominance, following the criteria of the aforementioned authors. In the second stage, the study will include the analysis and determination of the coronary pattern in vivo coronary angiography images. According to Schlessinger's (1940) criteria, our cadaver data show 73.5% of hearts with right dominance, 19.5% balanced dominance, and 7% left dominance. According to Falci Jr and co-workers's criteria (1994), our data show 50.6% of right dominance, 36.5% of balanced dominance, and 12.9% of left dominance. In both cases right dominance is predominant. Therefore, it is primarily understood that the regional population tends to have a lower risk of heart disease. However, the diversity of criteria adopted by each author can interfere with the research results, which reinforces the importance of a single criterion.