Fig. 15

Axial MDCTA image through the infratemporal fossa of a 59-year-old man who fell on to a garden bamboo stick (thin blue arrow) which penetrated the left buccal region of the facial soft tissues, lodging and breaking-off in the retropharyngeal region of the nasopharynx and causing dissection occlusion of the right internal carotid artery (note the normal contralateral left internal carotid artery [blue arrowhead]). The geometric margin of the air-containing abnormality highlights the radiologic features consistent with an embedded foreign body fragment of organic material (wood). The patient subsequently developed a near-total thromboembolic right middle cerebral artery territory infarct (imaging not shown)