Iatrogenic embolization: complication of pediatric cerebral angiography.

Fourteen cases of inadvertent iatrogenic embolization of cerebral vessels occurring in a consecutive series of 3,731 angiographies in infants and children were studies. The incidence of embolization(0.9% of all patients ond 0.4% of all angiographic examinations) was about the same as has been reported in adults, but the clinical consequences were much milder, only one patient having documented transient neurologic symptoms. Also the angiographic appearance of the emboli differed from those described in adults. These differences may in part be due to the technique (general anesthesia with hyperventilation) but also to different reactions towards ischemia and to different types of emboli in children.