• Po-Chuan Chen, Chin-Wang Hsu, Wen-I Liao, Yu-Long Chen, Cheng-Hsuan Ho, and Shih-Hung Tsai.
• Department of Emergency Medicine, Tri-Service General Hospital, National Defense Medical Center, Taipei 114, Taiwan.
• Am J Emerg Med. 2013 Sep 1;31(9):1420.e1-3.

AbstractFat embolism syndrome is a potentially fatal complication and occurs most commonly after long bone fracture. In patients who sustained severe trauma, both cerebral fat embolism(CFE) and diffuse axonal injury (DAI) could be the cause of altered consciousness in the absence of marked intracranial lesions in cranial computed tomography. However, distinguishing CFE and DAI can be difficult clinically. Generally, DAI develops immediately after the insult, whereas CFE occurs 48 to 72 hours after the trauma and even after internal fixation for the fractures. Fat embolism syndrome develops within an average of 48.5 hours after long bone fracture [1] but has never been reported to occur in less than 2 hours. Here, we present a patient who developed hyperacute CFE and eventually had poor neurological outcome, in contrast to previous reports stating that CFE usually has a long latent period and favorable outcomes.

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