Proximal stump of an occluded middle cerebral artery mimicking a ruptured saccular aneurysm

Abstract

It is difficult to distinguish a stump of occluded intracranial arteries from saccular aneurysms on computed tomography (CT) and angiography images. To our knowledge, a middle cerebral artery (MCA) vascular stump which mimicking an aneurysm is extremely rare. Although several cases of MCA vascular stump have been reported, they are usually asymptomatic or involve cases of ischemic stroke. Herein, we report a unique case of an occluded middle cerebral artery stump, which was considered as the source of a subarachnoid hemorrhage on preoperative CT angiogram images.