CASE REPORTS  VASCULAR PAPERS 

The Journal of Cardiovascular Surgery 1998 October;39(5):569-72

Copyright © 2000 EDIZIONI MINERVA MEDICA

language: English

Popliteal venous aneurysm with pulmonary embolism

Debing E., Vanhulle A.**, Verhaeghe W.*, Van Den Brande P.

From the Department of Vascular Surgery *Respiratory Division Academic Hospital, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussel, Belgium ** Department of Surgery Henri Serruys Hospital, Ostend, Belgium

Two pre­vi­ous­ly ­healthy ­patients ­were admit­ted ­for ­chest ­pain, hae­mop­ty­sis ­and dysp­noea. Perfusion-ven­ti­la­tion ­lung scan­ning dem­on­strat­ed pul­mo­nary embo­lism. Lower extrem­ity ­duplex imag­ing ­and con­trast venog­ra­phy ­revealed a throm­bosed pop­li­teal ­vein aneu­rysm as ­the ­source of embo­li. After imme­di­ate anti­co­ag­u­lant ther­a­py, ­the throm­bo-embol­ic ­source ­was exclud­ed by aneu­rys­mec­to­my ­with lat­er­al veno-gra­phy in ­the ­first ­patient. The sec­ond ­patient ­was treat­ed by anti­co­ag­u­lants ­and per­cut­ane­ous ­vena ­cava infe­ri­or fil­ter place­ment to pre­vent recur­rent pul­mo­nary embo­lism. Anatomopathological find­ings, pos­sible ori­gin, diag­nos­tic modal­ities ­and med­i­cal ­and sur­gi­cal treat­ment of pop­li­teal ­vein aneu­rysm ­are dis­cussed.