Eur J Cardiothorac Surg 2008;33:1140. doi:10.1016/j.ejcts.2008.03.005
Copyright © 2008, European Association for Cardio-thoracic Surgery. Published by Elsevier. All rights reserved.
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Extra-thoracic hematoma after minor blunt chest injury
Jong Hui Suh,
Yong Hwan Kim*
Department of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery, Uijeongbu St. Mary's Hospital, The Catholic University of Korea, College of Medicine, Seoul, Republic of Korea
Received 15 December 2007;
received in revised form 14 February 2008;
accepted 4 March 2008.
* Corresponding author. Address: Uijeongbu St. Mary's Hospital, 65-1, Geumo-dong, Uijeongbu, Gyeonggi-do 480-821, Republic of Korea. Tel.: +82 31 820 3586; fax: +82 31 847 2934. (Email: cmccs{at}naver.com).
Key Words: Chest injury • Hematoma • Internal mammary artery
A 59-year-old female presented with an acute onset of painful swelling on her left anterior chest wall after pounding her own chest in sorrow (Fig. 1
). The hematoma was removed through a limited subaxillary incision and we confirmed bleeding from a perforating branch of left internal mammary artery (Fig. 2
).
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Fig. 1. The patient was bruised at her parasternal area and showed asymmetric webbing of the axillary fold. She was previously healthy without coagulation disorders and not taking any medication. The physical examination showed no weakness of adduction and internal rotation of the shoulder.
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Fig. 2. Contrast-enhanced CT scan showed the leakage of contrast into the extra-thoracic and sub-pectoral space. It suggested the injury of a perforating branch of left internal mammary artery.
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Footnotes
This study was supported by grants from the Catholic University of Korea, College of Medicine.
