Case Report
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2015. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Cardiol. Feb 26, 2015; 7(2): 101-103
Published online Feb 26, 2015. doi: 10.4330/wjc.v7.i2.101
Pulmonary arterial dissection in a post-partum patient with patent ductus arteriosus: Case report and review of the literature
Mehmet Yaman, Uğur Arslan, Ahmet Hakan Ateş, Aytekin Aksakal
Mehmet Yaman, Uğur Arslan, Ahmet Hakan Ateş, Aytekin Aksakal, Department of Cardiology, Samsun Education and Research Hospital, 55400 Samsun, Turkey
Author contributions: All authors contributed to this work.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Uğur Arslan, MD, Associate Professor of Cardiology, Department of Cardiology, Samsun Education and Research Hospital, Barış Avenue, No:199 Ilkadim, 55400 Samsun, Turkey. ugurarslan5@yahoo.com
Telephone: +90-532-6039983
Received: September 19, 2014
Peer-review started: September 19, 2014
First decision: October 14, 2014
Revised: November 9, 2014
Accepted: November 17, 2014
Article in press: November 19, 2014
Published online: February 26, 2015
Processing time: 145 Days and 19 Hours
Abstract

Pulmonary arterial dissection is an uncommon but usually a deadly complication of chronic pulmonary hypertension. A 26-year-old female patient was admitted to our clinics with sudden dyspnea and chest discomfort one hour after giving birth to twins by vaginal delivery. An echocardiography was performed with a pre-diagnosis of pulmonary embolism. However, echocardiographic examination revealed a dilated main pulmonary artery and a dissection flap extending from main pulmonary artery to left pulmonary artery. In summary, in this report, we described a very rare case of pulmonary artery dissection in a pregnant patient with a previously un-diagnosed patent ductus arteriosus without an obvious rise in pulmonary artery pressure and reviewed the relevant literature.

Keywords: Pulmonary dissection; Patent ductus arteriosus; Pregnancy; Echocardiography; Computed tomography

Core tip: A 26-year-old female patient was admitted to our clinics with sudden dyspnea and chest discomfort one hour after giving birth to twins by vaginal delivery. Dilated main pulmonary artery and dissection flap extending from main pulmonary artery to left pulmonary artery were found in echocardiographic examination, there after, pulmonary dissection was confirmed by a computed tomography and the patient underwent surgery. In summary, in this report, we described a very rare case of pulmonary artery dissection in a pregnant patient with a previously un-diagnosed Patent ductus arteriosus without an obvious rise in pulmonary artery pressure and reviewed the relevant literature.