Diffusion-weighted imaging-detected ischemic lesions associated with flow-diverting stents in intracranial aneurysms: safety, potential mechanisms, clinical outcome, and concerns.

Object: It was initially considered safe for flow-diverting stents to cover the ostia of branching vessels during endovascular procedures for the treatment of intracranial aneurysms. As more recent evidence suggests, however, their use is not always free of ischemic concerns in terms of covered arterial ostia. The authors sought to determine the frequency of silent and clinically evident diffusion-weighted imaging (DWI)-detected abnormalities related to stent placement as a means of elucidating potential clinical risks.

Flow-diverting stents for intracranial bifurcation aneurysm treatment.

Background: Although initially considered safe when covering bifurcation sites, flow-diverting stents may provoke thrombosis of side branches that are covered during aneurysm treatment.

Objective: To understand the occurrence and clinical expression of side-branch remodeling in distal intracranial arterial sites after flow diverter deployment by means of correlation of imaging and clinical data.

Methods: We analyzed our prospectively collected data on a series of patients treated with flow diverters for intracranial aneurysms at bifurcation sites.