A Case of Mechanical Thrombectomy for Acute Ischaemic Stroke

After initially negative trials mechanical thrombectomy has had overwhelmingly positive outcomes as an acute intervention for ischaemic stroke due to large vessel occlusion. It can be used as an intervention coupled with thrombolysis or alone. When used alone it can be used in situations where thrombolysis was contraindicated or it was difficult to make risk benefit judgements e.g. post operatively, post trauma, colonic cancers or in pregnancy. There are complications and this case outlines these. It can also be hard to know who will most benefit from intervention particularly in extended time window or wake up cases and this case also discusses the use of CT perfusion in patient selection.