Mechanical Thrombectomy - a treatment of choice for acute ischemic stroke

Chennai (Tamil Nadu) [India], November 4 (ANI/PRNewswire): Clinical experts at Rela Hospital stressed that Mechanical Thrombectomy is effective in reducing the sequelae of an ischemic cerebrovascular accident (CVA) in humans and also gives better quality of life to those who suffer from stroke.
It was a regular day at work for the neurosciences team at Rela Hospital until a call from the emergency medicine team. A 66-year-old gentleman from Tiruvannamalai was received at Rela Emergency Care Unit in an unresponsive state. The family of the gentleman reported that he had multiple episodes of vomiting the previous evening, following which he had loss of balance and lost conscience over a period of 6 hrs.
When the neurosciences team evaluated the patient, he was drowsy, breathing by himself but was not responding to commands or moving his limbs. An emergency MRI Brain was arranged, which showed an acute stroke in rear part of the brain (posterior circulation stroke), because of a blood clot in one of the brain arteries. The family was counseled regarding Mechanical thrombectomy - a medical procedure by which through a small pinhole near the hip, special catheters are passed into the blood vessels and the clot in the brain artery is extracted, thereby opening the blocked vessel and returning normal flow to the brain. This procedure was successfully performed in our Cath lab by our neuro-intervention team led by Dr. Arul Arokia Sensan Babu. All this happened over the next few hours.
"Mechanical thrombectomy is a very novel procedure that has revolutionized the care and treatment of stroke patients. This treatment consists of extracting the thrombus or clot from the cerebral arteries in stroke patients, with the aim of restoring cerebral vascularization and accelerating their recovery. For this we access with a minimal incision in the femoral artery, and, by catheterization, we reach the affected cerebral artery to remove the thrombus with extraction devices", said Dr. Arul, Consultant from the Stroke Unit of Rela hospital.
After the procedure, the patient was managed in the multidisciplinary Intensive Care Unit under the guidance of Dr. Shubha Subramanian, a neurologist, and a team of intensivist led by Dr. Sathya. At the time of discharge, he was conscious, talking and feeding by himself, and he is independent for his daily activities and able to walk without difficulty.
"Timely diagnosis and appropriate delivery of care proved to be a game changer for this patient. Stroke, being a time-dependent emergency, requires rapid response. Once the diagnosis has been made, the neurologist activates the stroke code and in less than 15 minutes our team is ready in the interventional radiology room to perform the procedure. With this treatment we managed to remove the thrombus from the cerebral arteries in a high percentage of patients (85% -90%), leaving many of them with practically no sequelae or with mild sequelae," explained Dr. Shubha Subramanian, Consultant, neurologist, Rela hospital.
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