Pipeline embolization device repairs formerly untreatable aneurysms
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Patients with a brain aneurysm deemed untreatable now have a therapy option in the pipeline embolization device (PED).
Jacques Dion, director of the interventional neuroradiology division, is among the first physicians in the United States and the first in Georgia to use a PED to treat large or giant wide-necked aneurysms.
PED is for adults aged 22 years or older with large wide-necked intracranial aneurysms in the internal carotid artery. The metal device, ranging in size from 10 to 35 mm, is placed across the neck with the help of a catheter. The procedure redirects blood flow away from the aneurysm, causing the blood that remains in the aneurysm to form a clot that serves to prevent the aneurysm from rupturing.
Other existing techniques for treating wide-neck aneurysms are often invasive, leading to longer hospital stays and greater risk for complications, and they are thus inapplicable in patients who are medically fragile.
“The pipeline device may offer improved patient results with a safer and more effective treatment of large or giant wide-necked aneurysms, which until now has been an unmet clinical need,” says Dion. “We now have a surgical tool for those patients who have had no other options for treating this often debilitating and even fatal medical condition.”
