AXIS Vol. 4, Issue 2 (Spring 2013) 1 Variation of Suprascapular Artery Abduelmenem Alashkham a,b , Abdulrahman Alraddadi a,c , Roger Soames a a Centre for Human Anatomy and Identification, University of Dundee, Dundee, UK b Human Anatomy Department, Faculty of Medicine, University of Zawia, Zawia, Libya c Human Anatomy Department, Faculty of Medicine, King Saud Bin Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences , Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Abstract In a routine dissection of the left shoulder of a 62 years old female, the suprascapular artery was observed to arise from the thyrocervical trunk of the 1 st part of the subclavian artery. It passed anterior to scalenus anterior and ran posterolateral anterior to the brachial plexus and deep to the clavicle and subclavius. By tracing its course the suprascapular artery was found to accompany the suprascapular nerve underneath the transverse scapular ligament to reach the supraspinatus fossa and then the infraspinatus fossa through the spinoglenoid notch to share in the anastomosis around the scapula. The right suprascapular artery passed over the ligament which is an important variation in cases of suprascapular nerve compression. Introduction The suprascapular artery is a branch of the thyrocervical trunk from the 1 st part of the subclavian artery (Palastanga et al., 2006; Moore et al., 2010). As the suprascapular artery arises from the thyrocervical trunk of the 1 st part of the subclavian artery (Smith et al., 1983; Hall- Craggs, 1990; Monkhouse, 2001) it runs inferolaterally and posterior undercover of sternomastoid crossing anterior to scalenus anterior and the phrenic nerve to reach the posterior triangle of the neck. It crosses the 3 rd part of the subclavian artery, as well as the brachial plexus, and descends posterior and parallel to the clavicle and subclavius undercover of the posterior belly of omohyoid accompanied by the suprascapular nerve until they approach the superior border of the scapula. Once the suprascapular artery reaches the superior border, it passes superficial to the transverse scapular ligament, separating it from the suprascapular nerve, and enters the supraspinous fossa deep to supraspinatus. It then emerges through the spinoglenoid notch to reach the infraspinous fossa and descends inferiorly as far as the inferior angle of the scapula and shares in the anastomosis around the scapula (Gray, 1913; Sinnatamby, 2006; Faiz and Moffat, 2006; Ellis, 2006).