METASTATIC caneer to the heart assumes greater diagnostic and therapeutic importance as the incidence of cancer rises. The condition evidently was first described by Boneti in 1700.1 A report in the English literature appeared in 1822 of a case of testicular cancer with tumor filling the vena eava and extending to the edge of the Eustachian valve.2 Subsequent reports described metastases to all...

Aneurysms of the interatrial septum are rare. They have been associated with complications such as embolic phenomena and atrioventricular orifice obstruction. We describe two patients, one adult and one child, with atrial septal aneurysms that were diagnosed by real-time, two-dimensional echocardiography. Atrial septal aneurysms appeared as thin, localized outpouchings of the atrial septum that...

Soft tissue calcification is a pathological condition in which calcium and phosphate salts are deposited in the soft tissue organic matrix. This study presents an unusual calcification noted in the cartilaginous portion of the Eustachian tube. A 67-year-old woman presented for dental treatment, specifically for implant placement, and cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) was performed. The CBCT ...

n the third century (1,2) of arguing whether a patent foramen vale (PFO), caught repeatedly in the act of begetting paraoxical thromboembolism (PTE) (3–5), poses a significant hreat, some facts seem straightforward; some do not. A FO is required before birth. The fetal right ventricle is not apable of pumping all of the blood through the collapsed ungs. Birth changes this, as the passage throug...

Abnormal masses (tumors, thrombi, vegetations) must be distinguished from normal cardiac structures that may mimic a mass. The echocardiographic evaluation of intracardiac masses is dependent on the ability to distinguish normal from abnormal findings.1 Erroneous diagnoses may lead to inappropriate medical therapy and even inappropriate surgery.3 Recognition of such normal variants depends on i...

1 Renmy-Jardin M, Remy J, Wallaert B. Right-to-heft shunting through a patemmt forameim ovale without pulmonary hypertension: transient improivement after balloon catheter chomsure. Chest 1990; 97:1250-52 2 Bashour T, Kabbani 5, Saaloiuke M, Cheng TO. Persistent Eustachian valve causing severe cyanosis in atrial septal defect with noirnmai right heart pressures. Angiology 1983; 34:79-83 3 Sewar...