Acute aortic syndrome: Spectrum of imaging appearances.

Objectives: The main objective of this paper is to illustrate and analyse the spectrum of MDCT findings of the entities that compose acute aortic syndrome (AAS) - namely acute aortic dissection (AD), intramural hematoma (IMH) and penetrating atherosclerotic ulcer (PAU) - discussing their pathophysiology. These related entities have a similar nonspecific clinical presentation mimicking other conditions such as myocardial infarction. Therefore, a high degree of clinical suspicion should prompt immediate confirmation by non-invasive imaging techniques which can modify its natural history, being MDCT the technique of choice, allowing accurate detection, characterization and complications evaluation in the Emergency Department.