Aortic rupture in high-speed skiing crashes.
BACKGROUND
New equipment and techniques in winter sports, such as carving skis and snowboards, have brought up new trauma patterns into the spectrum of leisure trauma. The injuries resemble high-energy trauma known from road crashes. The aim of the present study was to assess the incidence of acute traumatic descending aortic rupture in recreational skiing-crashes.


METHODS
Between January 1995 and December 2004, 22 patients were admitted to our hospital for aortic rupture. Four patients had skiing crashes (18.2%). Mean age was 31 years, all patients were male. In two cases, aortic rupture was associated with fractures of the upper and lower extremities. One patient additionally had a cerebral contusion with an initial Glasgow Coma Scale score of 13. In two patients, isolated aortic rupture was diagnosed.


RESULTS
Two patients were treated by graft interposition, and one by endograft. One patient arrived under mechanical resuscitation without blood pressure. He died at admission. He had been observed for 5 hours in another hospital, complaining of severe intrascapular back pain, before transport to our trauma unit for unknown bleeding. In the other three cases, treatment was successful.


CONCLUSIONS
Rescue services and paramedics should be aware of this new type of injury. Acute aortic rupture has to be considered as possible injury in high velocity skiing crashes.
Heller
Georg
G
Department of Cardiovascular Surgery, University Hospital, Bern, Switzerland.
Immer
Franz F
FF
Savolainen
Hannu
H
Kraehenbuehl
Eva S
ES
Carrel
Thierry P
TP
Schmidli
Juerg
J
D000328:Adult; D001019:Aortic Rupture / Q000209:etiology* / Q000601:surgery; D003120:Colorado / Q000453:epidemiology; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D008297:Male; D012865:Skiing / Q000293:injuries*; D013895:Thoracic Arteries / Q000293:injuries* / Q000601:surgery