TGFBR2 mutation and MTHFR-C677T polymorphism in a Mexican mestizo population with cervico-cerebral artery dissection

Arterial dissections: Common features and new perspectives

Arterial dissections, which involve an abrupt tear in the wall of a major artery resulting in the intramural accumulation of blood, are a family of catastrophic disorders causing major, potentially fatal sequelae. Involving diverse vascular beds, including the aorta or coronary, cervical, pulmonary, and visceral arteries, each type of dissection is devastating in its own way. Traditionally they have been studied in isolation, rather than collectively, owing largely to the distinct clinical consequences of dissections in different anatomical locations - such as stroke, myocardial infarction, and renal failure. Here, we review the shared and unique features of these arteriopathies to provide a better understanding of this family of disorders. Arterial dissections occur commonly in the young to middle-aged, and often in conjunction with hypertension and/or migraine; the latter suggesting they are part of a generalized vasculopathy. Genetic studies as well as cellular and molecular investigations of arterial dissections reveal striking similarities between dissection types, particularly their pathophysiology, which includes the presence or absence of an intimal tear and vasa vasorum dysfunction as a cause of intramural hemorrhage. Pathway perturbations common to all types of dissections include disruption of TGF-β signaling, the extracellular matrix, the cytoskeleton or metabolism, as evidenced by the finding of mutations in critical genes regulating these processes, including LRP1, collagen genes, fibrillin and TGF-β receptors, or their coupled pathways. Perturbances in these connected signaling pathways contribute to phenotype switching in endothelial and vascular smooth muscle cells of the affected artery, in which their physiological quiescent state is lost and replaced by a proliferative activated phenotype. Of interest, dissections in various anatomical locations are associated with distinct sex and age predilections, suggesting involvement of gene and environment interactions in disease pathogenesis. Importantly, these cellular mechanisms are potentially therapeutically targetable. Consideration of arterial dissections as a collective pathology allows insight from the better characterized dissection types, such as that involving the thoracic aorta, to be leveraged to inform the less common forms of dissections, including the potential to apply known therapeutic interventions already clinically available for the former.

Case Report: Spontaneous Postpartum Quadruple Cervicocephalic Arterial Dissection With a Heterozygous COL5A1 Variant of Unknown Significance

Pregnancy-associated cervicocephalic arterial dissection is rare, and its pathophysiology remains poorly understood. Despite the hypothesized contribution to pathogenesis, connective tissue diseases and genetic factors are rarely identified in clinical cases. We describe a case of postpartum arterial dissection involving all four cervicocephalic arteries resulting in acute cerebral infarction. The patient underwent successful endovascular thrombectomy and angioplasty and recovered fully without sequelae. Genetic screening for connective tissue diseases identified a heterozygous missense COL5A1 variant with unknown clinical significance. Two genetically related family members later developed arterial abnormalities, and one of them tested positive for the same COL5A1 gene variant as our patient, while the other was scheduled for genetic testing. The extensive clinical presentation of our patient and the prevalence of arterial abnormalities in her family warrant further assessment of the association between the identified COL5A1 gene variant and the pathogenesis of arterial dissections.

[Dissection of the internal carotid artery in a patient with connective tissue dysplasia having risk variants of several candidate genes]

Spontaneous dissection of the vessels of the neck is one of the main causes of ischemic stroke in young patients under 45 years of age. According to morphological studies, dissection of the vessels of the neck can be based on dysplastic changes in the arterial wall in arteriopathies, Marfan syndrome, Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, undifferentiated connective tissue dysplasia. The article presents a case of spontaneous dissection of the internal carotid artery in a 30-year-old patient with clinical manifestations of undifferentiated connective tissue dysplasia and carriage of homozygous variants of candidate genes: 4G/4G of the PAI-1 (-675, 4G/5G), T/T of the MTHFR C677T, 5A/5A of the MMP-3 (-1171 5A/6A) and A/A of the MMP-9 (8202A/G).