Extracranial carotid artery aneurysms (ECAAs) are rare clinical findings, representing less than 1% of all arterial aneurysms. While often asymptomatic, they pose significant risks of cerebrovascular accidents, nerve compression, or fatal hemorrhage if left untreated. Effective diagnosis and management of internal carotid artery (ICA) aneurysms rely on a multi-modal imaging approach. This article explores the diagnostic pathways and management of ICA aneurysms through a case series. Two clinical examples of ICA aneurysms are explored with carotid duplex ultrasound with color Doppler and spectral analysis, as well as multi-slice computed tomography angiography (CTA) with 3-dimensional reformations. The first case demonstrates the benefits of multi-modality correlation, and the second case highlights both the initial detection of the pathology and post-surgical follow-up.
Nanni et al. (Mon,) studied this question.