Thrombosed varicose vein in the sternocleidomastoid muscle.
A thrombosed varicose vein arising in the neck is quite rare. A 68-year-old Japanese male was referred to our hospital because of a mass in his left upper neck. The mass did not change in size in response to strain resulting from Valsalva's manouvre. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) showed iso-signal intensity of the mass on T1-weighted images and a target-like signal arrangement (concentric hyper-, hypo-, hyper-signal intensity from outside to inside) on T2-weighted images. Surgical excision revealed that the tumour arose from the intramuscular small vein in the sternocleidomastoid muscle. The pathological examination revealed the mass to be a thrombosed varicose vein with capillarization in the dilated vein wall. The de-oxygenation and degradation of haemoglobin were thought to be responsible for these characteristic MRI findings. The concentric signal distribution on MRI strongly suggested this pathology.
Nishimura
Toshiro
T
Department of Otolaryngology--Head and Neck Surgery, Kanazawa University School of Medicine, Kanazawa, Japan. nishimut@orl.m.kanazawa-u.ac.jp
Nonomura
Akitaka
A
Ueda
Fumiaki
F
Furukawa
Mitsuru
M
D000368:Aged; D004108:Dilatation, Pathologic; D006801:Humans; D018810:Magnetic Resonance Angiography / Q000379:methods; D008297:Male; D018482:Muscle, Skeletal / Q000098:blood supply*; D009333:Neck / Q000098:blood supply; D014648:Varicose Veins / Q000175:diagnosis*; D020246:Venous Thrombosis / Q000175:diagnosis*