FATAL OCCLUSION OF THE LEFT CORONARY MAIN STEM BY A FRAGMENT FROM THEFEMORAL-ARTERY - A PREVIOUSLY UNREPORTED COMPLICATION OF CARDIAC-CATHETERIZATION

A 59-year-old man with grade In. angina pectoris and 80% stenosis of t he left anterior descending coronary artery developed an acute total o cclusion of the artery during percutaneous transluminal coronary angio plasty (PTCA). Attempts at recanalisation and resuscitation were ineff ective, and the patient died. The medico-legal autopsy revealed obstru ction of left main coronary artery by a ringshaped piece of arterial w all that had been torn out of the femoral artery at the punction site and driven around the tip of the catheter into the orifice of the left coronary artery, filling it. This kind of complication of PTCA has no t been described previously. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ireland Ltd.