Herniated cervical disk presenting as ischemic chest pain.

Abstract

Myocardial ischemia must be the first concern of every emergency physician in evaluating chest pain in the adult patient. Any suspicion of myocardial ischemia must be promptly evaluated and admitted. The American College of Emergency Physicians has recently published a standards document on the care of chest pain in the adult patient. The emergency physician must be familiar with this document. Once myocardial ischemia and other life-threatening causes are ruled out, one can consider that cervical disk disease may be the cause of chest pain. We present two cases of patients who presented to the emergency department with signs and symptoms consistent with cardiac ischemia. Both patients were found to have herniated cervical disks. Subsequent surgical repair completely relieved their symptoms. Evaluation of the literature shows that this entity was well described from 1950 to the 1960s. Most recent discussions do not mention disk herniation as even an infrequent cause of chest pain. If there is no life-threatening disease present, one should consider cervical disk disease.