Acquired coronary arterial aneurysms: an autopsy study of 52 patients

Abstract

In the past decade most studies of coronary arterial aneurysms have been clinical; few have focused on morphology and etiopathogenesis. The subjects of the present autopsy study were 52 patients, 5 months to 80 years of age, with coronary arterial aneurysms. Patients were divided into two groups: 38 with atherosclerotic coronary aneurysms and 14 with aneurysms secondary to inflammation. Of the 38 patients with atherosclerotic aneurysms, 20 (53 per cent) had histories of ischemic heart disease; the aneurysms were in the right coronary artery in 18 (47 per cent), the left coronary artery in 13 (35 per cent), and in the right and left coronary arteries in seven (18 per cent). Of the four major coronary arteries, the average number of severely narrowed arteries (reduction of more than 75 per cent) in cross-sectional luminal area) was 1.8/patient; aortic aneurysms were present in eight of these patients (24 per cent). Of the 14 patients with coronary aneurysms secondary to inflammation, four had histories of ischemic heart disease; 10 had histories of an influenza-like syndrome. Isolated left coronary arterial aneurysms were seen in six of these patients (43 per cent), while eight (51 per cent) had multiple right and left coronary arterial aneurysms. The average number of severely narrowed coronary arteries in this group was 1.5/patient, and only one patient had an aortic aneurysm. Therefore, patients with atherosclerotic aneurysms are more often symptomatic; they have increased heart weights and equal numbers of coronary arterial aneurysms in the right and left vessels, and the majority (89 per cent) have single aneurysms with thrombi in the lumen. Patients with coronary arterial aneurysms secondary to inflammation are younger; the majority of these patients have a prodromal influenza-like syndrome, a low incidence of ischemic heart disease, and multiple coronary arterial aneurysms.