Transesophageal Echocardiography Use in Diagnosis and Management of Embolized Intravascular Foreign Bodies

Abstract

The increasing use of endovascular interventions coupled with the large number of published case series detailing complications attest to the likelihood that anesthesiologists will encounter a case of intravascular foreign body embolization during their careers. Transesophageal echocardiography is essential to the diagnosis and management of traumatic and intravascular foreign bodies embolized to the heart because it can identify not only the foreign body but also hemodynamically significant lesions to radiolucent anatomic structures prior to and during surgical exploration. In this case presentation, we review how intraoperative transesophageal echocardiography facilitated the intraoperative assessment and management of a post–liver transplant patient who underwent open surgical removal of migrated inferior vena cava stent from the right ventricle with concomitant tricuspid valve annuloplasty.