Spontaneous coronary artery dissection

Spontaneous coronary artery dissection
Other names	Coronary artery dissection, SCAD
Coronary artery dissection involves the formation of a hematoma (purple) within the walls of the coronary artery.
Specialty	Cardiology
Diagnostic method	ECG, Angiography, Intracoronary optical coherence tomography, Intravascular ultrasound, Coronary CT angiography

Spontaneous coronary artery dissection (SCAD) is an uncommon but potentially lethal condition in which one of the coronary arteries that supply the heart, spontaneously develops a blood collection, or hematoma, within the artery wall due to a tear in the wall. SCAD is one of the arterial dissections that can occur.^[1]

SCAD is a major cause of heart attacks in young, otherwise healthy women who usually lack typical cardiovascular risk factors. While the exact cause is not yet known, SCAD is likely related to changes that occur during and after pregnancy, or possibly genetics, hormonal influences, inflammatory issues or changes due to disease. These changes lead to the dissection of the wall which restricts blood flow to the heart and causes symptoms. SCAD is often diagnosed in the cath lab with angiography, though more advanced confirmatory tests exist. While the risk of death due to SCAD is low, it has a relatively high rate of recurrence leading to further heart attack-like symptoms in the future.