Diagnosis of peripheral pulmonary emboli by computed tomography in the living dog.

Computed tomography (CT) provides a noninvasive alternative to arteriography in detecting central pulmonary thromboembolism. It is uncertain, however, if smaller, more peripheral clots can be diagnosed by means of CT because of the low spatial resolution and the possible motion artifacts that result from long exposure time. The peripheral pulmonary arteries of five dogs were embolized with boiled autologous clots. The location and size of the thromboemboli were then determined using arteriography. One dog died after embolization. In three of the four remaining dogs, CT scans, after slow intravenous injection of contrast material, showed the emboli as filling defects in the appropriate lobar and segmental arteries.