Source: Pain & Central Nervous System Week, 11/25/02
Treatment of ruptured aneurysms with microcoil stents is significantly more successful than surgery in achieving disability-free survival, according to a study in the medical journal, The Lancet. The procedure also reduces the rates of complications and patient dependence following surgery.
The 2002 report reflected one-year results for 1,594 of the 2,143 patients in the trial, which began in 1997. Click here to see final results published in 2005.
X-ray imaging is used to guide the procedure. Physicians watch video monitors that show the coil moving through the patient's veins, to the site of the hemorrhage. The coil is then released, closing the rupture. The alternate treatment involves performing a craniotomy in which surgeons remove a section of the patient's skull to place a surgical clip near the aneurysm.
This chart shows patient outcomes one year after the imaging-based procedure, versus open surgery. The outcomes with the image-based therapy were so favorable that the clinical study was stopped, thus allowing all patients to receive the therapy.
According to The Lancet study: "At 1 year, the relative risk of dependence or death was reduced [in coil patients] by 22.6 percent, with an absolute risk reduced of 6.9 percent." This result, achieving the primary objective of the study, led to trial recruitment being stopped early.
