ABSTRACT
Eosinophilic coronary monoarteritis is a rare condition of unexplained etiology involving selectively the left anterior descending coronary artery. This is a peculiar subset of the general pathoanatomic substrate of spontaneous coronary artery dissection. Dissection of the arterial wall ensues, complicated by acute coronary thrombosis and results in sudden death without any identifiable clinical features for a premortem diagnosis. Two recently investigated unrelated sudden deaths of young, otherwise completely healthy individuals, a white male and a white female, in the Oakland County Medical Examiner's Office prompted this report and a scrutiny of the related literature.
Subject(s)
Aortic Dissection/pathology , Arteritis/complications , Coronary Aneurysm/pathology , Death, Sudden/etiology , Eosinophilia/complications , Adult , Aortic Dissection/etiology , Arteritis/pathology , Coronary Aneurysm/etiology , Coronary Thrombosis/pathology , Coronary Vessels/pathology , Eosinophilia/pathology , Female , Forensic Pathology , Humans , Male , Myocardial Ischemia/pathology , Pulmonary Edema/pathology , Splenomegaly/pathologyABSTRACT
To examine the proximate circumstances of sudden cardiac death (SCD) in the setting of major snowstorms, we reviewed records from the medical examiners' offices of 3 counties in the weeks before, during, and after 2 heavy snowfalls that occurred in the greater metropolitan Detroit area. Of those who experienced SCD due to atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (n = 271), 36 (33 men, 3 women) were engaged in snow removal, representing the largest number of exertion-related deaths after heavy snowfalls reported to date.
