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Hong, Choi, and Kim: Free Floating Left Atrial Thrombus Disappearing during Echocardiography
Images in Cardiovascular Ultrasound

Journal of Cardiovascular Ultrasound 2013; 21(3): 152-153.

Published online: 30 September 2013

DOI: https://doi.org/10.4250/jcu.2013.21.3.152

Free Floating Left Atrial Thrombus Disappearing during Echocardiography

Seung Pyo Hong, MD, Ji Yong Choi, MD, Kee Sik Kim, MD, PhD

Department of Cardiology, Daegu Catholic University Medical Center, Daegu, Korea.

Address for Correspondence: Seung Pyo Hong, Department of Cardiology, Daegu Catholic University Medical Center, 33 Duryugongwon-ro 17-gil, Nam-gu, Daegu 705-718, Korea Tel: +82-53-650-3015, Fax: +82-53-621-3166, hongbanchang@gmail.com

Received 21 June 2013       Revised 26 July 2013       Accepted 12 August 2013

Copyright © 2013 Korean Society of Echocardiography

(open-access):

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Keywords: Thrombus, Left atrium, Echocardiography

An 82-year-old woman with a history of previous cerebral infarction and atrial fibrillation was hospitalized with aphagia. Brain magnetic resonance imaging showed a dot-like high signal intensity in the left occipital subcortex. With a working diagnosis of acute cerebral infarction due to cardiac emboli, trans-thoracic echocardiography (TTE) was performed. The TTE showed an oval shaped, mobile thrombus, approximately 1.9 × 1.5 cm in size within the left atrial appendage. For further evaluation of mobile thrombus in the left atrial appendage, a trans-esophageal echocardiography (TEE) was done. The TEE showed an oval shaped, mobile thrombus in the left atrial appendage (Fig. 1A). Subsequently, during follow-up TTE, the thrombus was found to be freely floating in the left atrial cavity during each cardiac cycle (Fig. 1B-F and Supplementary movie 1). After a number of cardiac cycles, the thrombus suddenly disappeared in TTE. The patient's overall clinical condition and neurologic examination continued to appear stable for the entirety of echocardiographic examination.
After one day, the patient complained claudication in the lower right limb. In physical examination, the patient's femoral pulses were not present to prompt a pulse exam. We performed a 3-dimensional (3D) femoral computer tomography (CT) to evaluate for occlusion. The 3D femoral CT showed a new filling defect in the right femoral artery in comparison with an abdominal enhanced CT performed for evaluation of fever 2 days ago (Fig. 2). Following the examination, the patient was placed on warfarin for anticoagulation therapy. The patient was discharged from the hospital with an uneventful recovery and has been doing well without additional embolic events after discharge and maintenance anticoagulation therapy.
Left atrial free floating thrombus is infrequent but predominantly associated with mitral valve disease, atrial fibrillation, as in our case, and hypertrophic cardiomyopathy.1-4) The presence of left atrial free floating thrombus is linked to higher embolic rates and the most common presentation of left atrial thrombus is, as in our case, peripheral embolization.5) This case is an interesting case of free-floating left atrial thrombus disappearing during echocardiography.

Figures and Tables

Fig. 1
Trans-esophageal echocardiography showed a free floating thrombus in the left atrial appendage (A). Trans-thoracic echocardiography (TTE) showed free floating thrombus in the left atrial appendage (B). TTE showed the thrombus moving from left atrial appendage to left atrial cavity (C-F).
jcu-21-152-g001
Fig. 2
Abdominal enhanced computer tomography (CT) for evaluation of fever did not show a filling defect in the right femoral artery in axial plane 2 days ago (A and C). 3-dimensional (3D) femoral CT showed a filling defect (arrow) in the right femoral artery in axial plane (B and D). 3D femoral CT showed a filling defect (arrow) in the right femoral artery in 3D reconstruction (E).
jcu-21-152-g002

References

1. Schäfer RO, Evers G, Morgan P, Thiel H. Left atrial ball thrombus in combined mitral-aortic valve disease. Eur Heart J. 1992; 13:287–288.
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2. Dua A, Sharma D, Siwach SB. Left atrial ball thrombus: echocardiographic features and clinical implications. J Assoc Physicians India. 1994; 42:637–638.
3. Tanoue K, Sonoda M, Maeda N, Ikeda D, Tashiro H, Tanoue K, Terashi T, Nakamura K. A novel clinical course of free-floating left atrial ball thrombus without mitral stenosis treated by anticoagulants. J Cardiol. 2009; 54:297–299.
crossref
4. Gurcun U, Boga M, Ozkisacik EA, Badak MI, Discigil B. Left atrial free-floating ball thrombus in a case of hyperthrophic cardiomyopathy. J Thromb Thrombolysis. 2005; 20:39–41.
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5. Tsioufis CP, Stefanadis CI, Tsiamis EG, Kallikazaros IE, Toutouzas PK. A free floating ball thrombus in the left atrial cavity. J Thorac Cardiovasc Surg. 1999; 118:1120–1122.
crossref

Supplementary movie legends

Movie 1

Trans-thoracic echocardiography showed the free floating thrombus in the left atrial appendage and left atrial cavity. The thrombus moved from left atrial appendage to left atrial cavity where it was free floating during each cardiac cycle.
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