Sudden deaths from eosinophilic coronary monoarteritis: a subset of spontaneous coronary artery dissection

Eosinophilic coronary monoarteritis is a rare condition of unexplained etiology involving selectively the left anterior descending coronary artery. This is a peculiar subset of the general pathoanatomic substrate of spontaneous coronary artery dissection. Dissection of the arterial wall ensues, complicated by acute coronary thrombosis and results in sudden death without any identifiable clinical features for a premortem diagnosis. Two recently investigated unrelated sudden deaths of young, otherwise completely healthy individuals, a white male and a white female, in the Oakland County Medical Examiner's Office prompted this report and a scrutiny of the related literature.