Bilateral Internal Carotid Artery Occlusion Secondary to Closed Head Injuries.

Complications of basilar skull fracture, such as carotid cavernous fistulae, meningitis, cerebrospinal fluid rhinorrhoea and otorrhoea, pneumatocele, and various cranial nerve disturbances, are well known (Gurdjian and Webster, 1958). In -addition, unilateral thrombosis of the internal carotid artery, both with and without basilar skull fracture, has frequently been reported after closed head and neck injury (Ecker, 1945; Higazi, 1963, Hockaday, 1959; Murray, 1957; Northcroft and Morgan, 1944; Schneider and Lemmen, 1952). Bilateral occlusion of the internal carotid arteries as a cause of death secondary to basilar skull fracture has apparently not been reported. This presentation demonstrates preand post-mortem documentation of a case of bilateral internal carotid occlusion in the carotid siphon secondary to fracture of the cranial base.