Health A-Z

Medical Content Created by the Faculty of the
Harvard Medical School

Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm

Diagnosis

Your doctor will ask you about your family history of heart disease, especially about any relatives whose deaths were sudden and, perhaps, unexplained. Your doctor will ask if you smoke and determine if you have high cholesterol, high blood pressure or diabetes.

Sometimes, your doctor may suspect that you have an aortic aneurysm based on hearing the sound of abnormal blood flow in your abdomen during a physical exam. If you have an abdominal aortic aneurysm, your doctor may see and feel a pulsating mass in your abdomen when you are lying down. This mass usually is in the center of the abdomen, just above the navel.

In 75% of people with an abdominal aortic aneurysm, the aneurysm is found when an X-ray or other type of scan is done for an unrelated illness. Aortic aneurysms can be discovered on plain X-rays, ultrasound, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), computed tomography (CT) scans and angiography (a view of the blood vessels obtained by injecting a radioactive substance into the patient).

To test for abdominal aortic aneurysms, ultrasound is very accurate and relatively inexpensive. It also doesn't expose people to radiation.