An uncommon complication of infective bacterial endocarditis

Abstract

Coronary artery septic embolisation resulting in cardioembolic myocardial infarction (MI) is a rare complication of bacterial infective endocarditis (IE), representing <1% of complications related to IE. Diagnosis requires a combination of high clinical suspicion, coronary angiography, echocardiography and cultures of peripheral blood and/or embolic material. The associated mortality rate remains high despite early diagnosis. Optimal interventional therapy is unknown with published international experience over the past two decades limited to very small case series and individual case reports. We present a case of ST elevation MI resulting from coronary artery septic embolisation with an accompanying comprehensive review of the literature.