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- Published on: 25 April 2017
- Published on: 20 February 2017
- Published on: 25 April 2017‘Continuous’ vs. continuous
To the Editor:
We read with great interest the article by McTaggart et al. on the new embolectomy technique called Continuous Aspiration Prior To Intracranial Vascular Embolectomy (CAPTIVE).(1) The paper adds information on the supporting evidence that a combined approach of stentretriever and aspiration-catheter utilization may be the optimal path in achieving higher rates of complete reperfusion in patients with large vessel occlusions.(2, 3) While the idea of starting aspiration with the intermediate catheter prior to and during the stentretriever placement is intriguing, attention has to be paid on the effect of prolonged aspiration on collateral flow, as reported in a recent JNIS publication.(4) Additionally, the ‘continuous’ part of the title may be misleading, as the authors state that they advance the aspiration-catheter towards the face of the clot until the drip rate has stopped. As seen in Fig 1E of the CAPTIVE publication, the tip of the aspiration-catheter becomes clogged with clot as ‘a portion is held captive within the distal aspiration catheter.’ This probably results in vacuum within the aspiration-catheter and non-existent aspiration in the vicinity of the aspiration-catheter tip during immobilization of the stentretriever/clot/aspiration-catheter unit. At last, the authors describe thoroughly a ‘De-CAPTIVE shear’ on Fig 2 but neglect to acknowledge that the same danger of clot-shearing applies to the moments of stentretriever/clot/aspiration-cath...
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None declared. - Published on: 20 February 2017Interest of a balloon guide catheter in association with the CAPTIVE technique
We have read with great interest the article describing the CAPTIVE technique for endovascular acute ischemic treatment by McTaggart et al.1. Firstly, we would like to commend the great clarity they used to describe the combination of distal aspiration and stent retriever to perform mechanical thrombectomy. Notably, they illustrated the rationale for aspiration prior to stent deployment as well as the removal of both distal aspiration catheter and stent as a single unit to decrease possible clot fragmentation.
We adopt a very similar approach for most of our cases, although we would like to emphasize a slight variant that appears clinically interesting.In combination with stent retrievers, the balloon guide catheter (BGC) has been shown to improve the effectiveness of mechanical thrombectomy2, 3. In our experience, we typically use the CAPTIVE technique in association with a BGC which presents several potential advantages.
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Firstly, in cases of tortuous anatomy it provides excellent support for navigating the distal aspiration catheter. In addition, the balloon can be temporarily inflated at this stage to provide an anchoring effect in order to avoid potential push back of the guiding catheter4.
Secondly, McTaggart et al. reported 5% embolization to new territory with the CAPTIVE technique; an equivalent rate to previous reports on distal aspiration with no stent retriever5. In an in vitro study, Chueh et al.6 demonstrated a significant decrease o...Conflict of Interest:
None declared.