Bilateral occlusion of basilar artery branches.

In a case in which the patient became totally paralysed except for blinking and vertical eye movements, microscopic serial sections of the pons showed bilateral infarcts which were due to occlusion of two small basilar branch arteries, one on each side. One basilar branch was occluded by an atheroma lying at its junction with the basilar artery and the other by an intramural dissection within the wall of the basilar artery. This case provides the clinico-pathological correlation for two further basilar branch infarcts. An unusual finding was that one of the branch arteries supplied the basis pontis and medulla bilaterally.