Tortuous carotid artery lumens in Takayasu's arteritis

Abstract

We report a 68-year-old woman who was incidentally diagnosed as having an occlusion in the right internal carotid artery on magnetic resonance angiography. On ultrasound, the right common carotid artery showed narrow and tortuous lumens, which suggest the uneven thickening of the arterial wall in the nonactive stage of Takayasu's arteritis. Although macaroni-like diffuse and circumferential thickening of the arterial wall is a known ultrasonographic finding of Takayasu's arteritis, the tortuous sign also appears to be characteristic as an ultrasonographic finding of the healed arteritis in aged patients.