Spinal grey matter infarction after aortic surgery: a case of persistent pure flaccid paraplegia.

In spite of great advances in the management of vascular diseases, spinal cord infarction still remains a rare but severe event after aortic surgery. The spectrum of clinical presentation includes segmental or distal spinal cord as well as lumbosacral nerve root or plexus syndrome, so that spastic (central) and/or fl accid (peripheral) paraparesis or paraplegia, associated with disturbances in sensory and vegetative functions, commonly occurs. Electrophysiologic studies may help localize the injury ; however, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is considered the first-line investigation. In our patient, MRI showed signal intensity changes that were highly suggestive of a distal infarction in the late state, involving only the grey matter with sparing of white bundles.To our knowledge, a similar postoperative anatomoclinical pattern has so far never been well documented