Primary Cardiac
Angiosarcoma Detected by Magnetic Resonance Imaging but not by Computed
Tomography
Moriaki Inoko,
Kanji Iga, Katsuhide Kyo, Hirokazu Kondo, Toshihiro Tamura, Chisato Izumi,
Shouji Kitagichi, Toshiro Hirozane, Yoshihiro Himura, Hiromitsu Gen, and
Takashi Konishi
From the
Department of Cardiology, Tenri Hospital, Tenri,
Abstract
A
51-year-old man with a primary angiosarcoma of the right atrium is
reported. The angiosarcoma was not
detected by transthoracic echocardiography or computed tomography, but magnetic
resonance imaging and transesophageal echocardiography did show the tumor of
the right atrial free wall. We
performed a transvenous endomyocardial biopsy of the tumor under the guidance
of transesophageal echocardiography and made the pathological diagnosis. This case demonstrates the advantage of
magnetic resonance imaging and transesophageal echocardiography for tumor
detection over transthoracic echocardiography and computed tomography and the
usefulness of transesophageal echocardiography for guiding the right atrial
endomyocardial biopsy procedure.
Key Words:
Transesophageal
echocardiography, Transvenous endomyocardial biopsy