vertebral vein

The external and the anterior jugular and the vertebral veins converge toward it.

It can also drain into the superior intercostal vein, or the vertebral vein of its corresponding side.

The prostatic venous plexus connects with vertebral veins, this is thought to be the route of bone metastasis of prostate cancer.

In the upper six vertebrae, the foramen gives passage to the vertebral artery, vertebral vein, and a plexus of sympathetic nerves.

It receives tributaries from the plexuses around the spinous processes of the cervical vertebræ, and terminates in the lower part of the vertebral vein.

The 1st posterior intercostal vein, supreme intercostal vein, drains into the brachiocephalic vein or the vertebral vein.

It includes the prevertebral muscles (longus colli and longus capitis), vertebral artery, vertebral vein, scalene muscles, phrenic nerve and part of the brachial plexus.

The right and left vertebral veins drain the vertebrae and muscles into the right subclavian vein and into the superior vena cava, into the right atrium of the heart.

In front of it are the internal jugular and vertebral veins, and it is crossed by the inferior thyroid artery; the left vertebral is crossed by the thoracic duct also.

From the plexus emerges a single vessel, which pierces the cranial attachment of the Trapezius and, dipping into the venous plexus of the suboccipital triangle, joins the deep cervical and vertebral veins.

Near the base of the skull they unite, and form two or three small trunks, which communicate with the vertebral veins, and then end in the inferior cerebellar veins, or in the inferior petrosal sinuses.

The vertebral vein is formed in the suboccipital triangle, from numerous small tributaries which spring from the internal vertebral venous plexuses and issue from the vertebral canal above the posterior arch of the atlas.

Around the foramen magnum they form an intricate network which opens into the vertebral veins and is connected above with the occipital sinus, the basilar plexus, the condyloid emissary vein, and the rete canalis hypoglossi.

It is crossed by the internal jugular and vertebral veins, by the vagus nerve and the cardiac branches of the vagus and sympathetic, and by the subclavian loop of the sympathetic trunk which forms a ring around the vessel.

Batson noted "the extensive filling of the vertebral veins, the superior longitudinal sinus, transverse sinus as well as other dural and cerebral veins" following injection of radiopaque material into a superficial venule in the left breast (Batson 1940, Figure 5, page 143).

In 1957 Batson wrote, ""It seems incredible that a great functional complex of veins would escape recognition as a system until 1940 .... In the first four decades of the last [19th] century, our knowledge of the vertebral veins was developed and then almost forgotten."

The second part runs upward through the foramina in the transverse processes of the C6 to C2 vertebræ, and is surrounded by branches from the inferior cervical sympathetic ganglion and by a plexus of veins which unite to form the vertebral vein at the lower part of the neck.