All in the Family: A Curious Case of Aortopathy

Abstract

The patient had a history of intermittent headaches and presented at a hospital outside of our institution with a few days history of severe pain and swelling of the right leg and dyspnea. A venous ultrasound of the right leg revealed a large occlusive deep vein thrombosis (DVT) extending from the right common femoral vein to the right popliteal vein. A computed tomography (CT) angiogram of the chest revealed a mid ascending thoracic aortic aneurysm measuring 5.9 cm, a pulmonary artery dilatation measuring 3.2 cm, and no evidence of pulmonary embolus. The patient was started on a regimen of anticoagulation with intravenous heparin and was transferred to our institution for surgical management of the aortic aneurysm and evaluation for large vessel vasculitis.