Skip to main content
. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2010 Dec 22.
Published in final edited form as: Circulation. 2010 Nov 1;122(20):2031–2038. doi: 10.1161/CIRCULATIONAHA.109.866053

Figure 4.

Figure 4

A through E, Nonstenotic ruptured, hemorrhagic type VI plaque and acute embolic stroke. A 79-year-old man with hypertension presented with acute onset right-sided numbness, weakness, and inability to speak. He was imaged within 28 hours of symptom onset. A and B, T1- and T2-weighted blood-suppressed images demonstrate an abnormally thickened vessel wall with radial signal inhomogeneity suggesting type VI atherosclerotic plaque. C, Axially reformatted 3D MRA data demonstrate contrasted blood extending into the vessel wall as indicated by the arrowhead, tracking circumferentially between the 4 and 8 o’clock positions, a specific sign indicating plaque cap rupture and thereby confirming the type VI classification. The MRA maximum intensity projection (D) demonstrates a focal mild circumferential stenosis at the level of this plaque, indicated by the gray line. A representative section of the clinical cerebral diffusion-weighted image (E) demonstrates multiple acute left middle cerebral artery territory infarctions, indicated by white arrows.