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This is the PORTAL SYSTEM, the drainage system of the GI tract. Because the blood from the gut may have picked up questionable material from digestion, it is important to run it through the liver for processing and detoxification before letting it circulate to the rest of the body. The main channel is the SMV (which runs parallel to the SMA), receiving many branches from small intestine and right and transverse colon. The IMV is smaller and drains the left colon. The splenic vein also joins this system, but in this patient it did not fill very well and cannot be seen, only estimated in position by the dotted lines. All of these channels come together to form the portal vein, which drains into the undersurface of the liver in the porta hepatis (door of the liver), accompanied by the proper hepatic artery and the bile duct. The catheter that was used to inject into the SMA is shown in yellow.
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