Fibromuscular dysplasia is a non-atherosclerotic, non-inflammatory vascular disease that is most commonly found in the renal arteries of pre-menopausal women. However, this disease entity has rarely been described in the coronary arteries and small cardiac conduction arteries. To our knowledge, there is no recorded case of fibromuscular dysplasia in small cardiac conduction arteries in infants/children. In this report, we present a case of unexplained death of a 14 month old wherein routine histologic examination failed to reveal a cause of death, but subsequent submission of the cardiac conduction system (atrioventricular [AV] and sinoatrial [SA] node regions) demonstrated the presence of isolated AV nodal artery fibromuscular dysplasia, which was considered the cause of death. The case serves to emphasize the potential importance of evaluating the cardiac conduction system in cases where routine gross and microscopic autopsy fails to reveal an adequate explanation for death.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.