Diseases of the thoracic aorta and pulmonary arteries

Abstract

Many acute and chronic clinical entities can affect the great thoracic arteries. As clinical findings are often unreliable, (mostly) noninvasive imaging plays a crucial role both in the initial assessment of critically ill patients, and in the follow-up of chronic conditions. Imaging also forms an increasingly important role in the pre-procedural planning of a wide variety of endovascular interventions. In this chapter, we review and compare the multimodality imaging findings of the most common pathological entities affecting the thoracic arteries. We highlight their strength and weaknesses, and provide recommendation for structural reporting.