[Basilar artery thrombosis with atypical course]

The authors report a 49-year-old man in whom continuous left-sided headaches increasing recently in intensity suggested presence of brain tumour. Sudden clinical deterioration on the 7th day of hospital observation was supposed to be due to brain-stem herniation. On autopsy a thrombus was found filling the basilar artery and the proximal parts of the posterior cerebral arteries with foci of softening in the right hemisphere, brain stem and left cerebellar hemisphere. The authors suppose that headaches were of vascular origin.