Open Access
CC BY 4.0 · J Neuroanaesth Crit Care
DOI: 10.1055/s-0045-1805055
Case Report

Pulmonary Embolism and Posterior Circulation Infarcts Following Position Change from Prone to Supine during Cervical Spine Surgery: A Case Report

Anirban B. Adhikary
1   Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Rishikesh, Uttarakhand, India
,
1   Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Rishikesh, Uttarakhand, India
,
Ramanand V. Jadhav
1   Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Rishikesh, Uttarakhand, India
,
Ranjay Mahaseth
1   Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Rishikesh, Uttarakhand, India
› Institutsangaben
Preview

Abstract

Acute massive pulmonary embolism (PE) is a lethal condition unless promptly detected and managed. Diagnosing and managing massive PE during the perioperative period can be challenging due to overlapping clinical signs with other complications. This case report highlights the challenges of diagnosing and managing a massive PE in a patient with morbid obesity who underwent instrumentation of the cervical spine at multiple levels and developed cardiac arrest while turning the patient supine from the prone position. With the help of focused cardiac ultrasound, we suspected PE, which was later confirmed on imaging. Postoperative brain imaging also confirmed the presence of multiple embolic infarcts in the occipital and cerebellar hemispheres.



Publikationsverlauf

Artikel online veröffentlicht:
29. April 2025

© 2025. The Author(s). This is an open access article published by Thieme under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, permitting unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction so long as the original work is properly cited. (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)

Thieme Medical and Scientific Publishers Pvt. Ltd.
A-12, 2nd Floor, Sector 2, Noida-201301 UP, India