Changes in cardiac repolarization and ventricular conduction in a case of acute hematomyelia. Report of a case.

Abstract

A twenty year old man presented an acute hematomyelia at T2-T3 level and had electrocardiographic changes suggesting subendocardial and subepicardial ischemia; he also had precordial pain and elevation of the MB fraction of creatine phosphokinase. Neurons providing heart inervation are located at the T2-T3 spinal level. The electrocardiographic changes observed were considered neurogenic in origin and were transient. Although there are experimental reports showing electrocardiographic changes associated with compression of the upper part of thoracic spinal cord, this is the first report to our knowledge, in which an acute spinal injury is shown to be associated with neurogenic changes in ventricular repolarization simulating acute myocardial ischemia.