[Dyspnoea Due to Foreign Embolism after Percutaneous Vertebroplasty]

Emergency admission of a 66-years-old man with right-sided and partly breath-dependent chest pain in the interdisciplinary emergency room. The complaints existed for several days and had a progressive character. Purulent expectoration and fever were negated. There was a history of COPD with occasional pulmonary exacerbations. Several weeks before the current event, community-acquired pneumonia had been treated with antibiotics. Moreover, the patient reported on multiple spine surgery procedures performed in recent months.

In transthoracic echocardiography (TTE), detection of a foreign body (Palacos) in the right ventricle, which was confirmed to be a toothpick-like structure in the supplementary CT scan of the thorax and the transoesophageal echocardiography (TOE).

Foreign body extraction using right anterior mini thoracotomy. Subsequently, iatrogenic pneumothorax with bilateral nosocomial pneumonia and drainage. After short-term convalescence, renewed admission with bilateral pulmonary infiltrates. Under invasive ventilation, new left-sided pneumothorax was diagnosed, which was supplied with a Bülau drainage. Due to the detection of positive blood cultures, re-conducting of a TOE examination. Now first diagnosis of tricuspid valve endocarditis. Despite successful surgical biologic tricuspid valve replacement with an epicardial pacemaker electrode placement, the patient died approximately three quarters of a year after he became an emergency patient due to dyspnoea.

The present case shows that a typical clinical symptom, associated with a previously known chronic illness, has to be reminded again and again of other and less common diseases. Even everyday diagnostic and therapeutic procedures are associated with a residual risk of possible complications.