Citation

Mastroroberto P, Di Mizio G, Colosimo F, Ricci P. J. Forensic Sci. 2011; 56(5): 1349-1351.

Affiliation

Cardiovascular Surgery, Department of Experimental and Clinical Medicine, University Magna Graecia, Viale Europa, 88100 Catanzaro, Italy. Legal Medicine, Department of Experimental and Clinical Medicine, University Magna Graecia, Viale Europa, 88100 Catanzaro, Italy.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2011, American Society for Testing and Materials, Publisher John Wiley and Sons)

DOI

10.1111/j.1556-4029.2011.01817.x

PMID

21644989

Abstract

Blunt chest trauma from rapid automobile airbag deployment causing coronary artery occlusion and myocardial infarction is a rare but potentially fatal condition. We present the case of a 37-year-old man who developed extensive anterior and inferior myocardial infarction because of occlusion of both left anterior and right coronary arteries following blunt injury to the chest in a car accident. The patient was scheduled for emergency coronary angiography but left and right coronary ostia were not cannulated because of thrombus formation probably. The patient died, and the autopsy revealed external compression by epicardial hematomas involving separately left and right coronary arteries and the coronary sinus without signs of coronary and/or aortic dissection. To our knowledge, this is the first case presenting occlusion of both coronary arteries secondary to blunt chest trauma causing acute myocardial infarction in a young man without signs of prior coronary artery disease.

Language: en