Bilateral internal carotid artery disease secondary to cervical radiation. A case report.

A patient with radiation-induced bilateral carotid artery disease is presented. A fifty-six-year-old man was admitted to hospital for evaluation of recurrent transient ischemic attacks. He had received cervical radiation for pharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma five years earlier. The radiation was directed at the cervical fields bilaterally and the anterior cervical field using x-rays for a total of 120 Gy. Computed tomography of the brain obtained at admission revealed a low-density area in the right parietal lobe. Carotid arteriograms revealed a completely occluded right internal carotid artery and a severely narrowed left internal carotid artery. There was good collateral supply from the posterior communicating arteries to the internal carotid arteries, bilaterally. The patient was medically treated with anticoagulant and antiplatelet therapy and has been free of subsequent cerebral ischemic attacks.