Rinsho Shinkeigaku (Clinical Neurology)

Brief Clinical Note

Embolic stroke with mobile thrombus in carotid artery induced by antiphospholipid antibody syndrome

Noriko Hagiwara, M.D., Yumi Nishimura, M.D., Kazunori Toyoda, M.D., Shigeru Fujimoto, M.D. and Yasushi Okada, M.D.

Department of Cerebrovascular Disease, Cerebrovascular Center and Clinical Research Institute, National Kyushu Medical Center

We report a 56-year-old woman suffering from an embolic brain infarction in her right frontal lobe. Carotid ultrasonogram showed a mass-shaped thrombus with little atherosclerotic change of underlying intima-media in the right common carotid artery. The thrombus was reduced with treatment and changed to mobile slender thrombus on admission. No other embolic sources were detected even using transesophageal echocardiography. Her blood test indicated existence of antiphospholipid antibody syndrome (APS) complicated with mixed connective tissue disease as an etiology of this uncommon carotid thrombus. The thrombus disappeared completely after two-week intensive antithrombotic therapy. This is a valuable report that arterial thrombi accompanied by APS could be detected by carotid ultrasound and observed until thrombus was disappeared. When we manage APS patients, it is important to rule out thrombus formation in the carotid artery using ultrasonography from the point of stroke prevention.

(CLINICA NEUROL, 43: 366|369, 2003)
key words: antiphospholipid antibody syndrome, mixed connective tissue disease, brain infarction, antithrombotic therapy, carotid ultrasonogram

(Received: 12-Feb-03)