Role of Doppler color ultrasonography in the diagnosis of carotid vessel anomalies

: Anomalies of the carotid vessels are compared with a frequency of 4-16% in the angiographic experience but such data don't reflect the real prevalence. In fact those anomalies are often asymptomatic for which only few patients with this anomaly are evaluated by morphological studies. The authors reviewing their experience of 3033 echo duplex of the cervical vessels have underlined 166 patients with anomalies of the carotid vessel course. In these cases has been evaluated the capacity of the echo duplex to characterize such anomalies also in relation to other imaging techniques like traditional angiography and magnetic resonance. The echo duplex is a good test and could be used not only to study symptomatic patients but also to screen the general population.