Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jul 4, 2026
Simulator Training for Endovascular Neurosurgery
Published on: May 6, 2020
Initial experience in establishing an academic neuroendovascular service: program building, procedural types, and
Adnan I Qureshi1, Vallabh Janardhan, Muhammad Zeeshan Memon
1Zeenat Qureshi Stroke Research Center and Departments of Neurology, Neurosurgery, and Radiology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55455, USA. aiqureshi@hotmail.com
Objective:
To report our initial experience in setting up a neuroendovascular service in a university-based comprehensive stroke center.
Methods:
We determined the rates of referral path, procedural type, and independently adjudicated 1-month outcomes (actual rates) in first 150 procedures (120 patients) and subsequently compared with rates derived from pertinent clinical trials after adjustment for procedural type (predicted rates).
Results:
The patients were referred from the emergency department (n= 44), transferred from another hospital (n= 13), or admitted for elective procedures from the clinic (n= 63). The procedures included treatment of acute ischemic stroke (n= 12); extracranial carotid stent placement (n= 33); extracranial vertebral artery stent placement (n= 13); intracranial angioplasty and/or stent placement (n= 12); embolization for intracranial aneurysms (n= 35), arteriovenous malformations (n= 5), and tumors (n= 10); cerebral vasospasm treatment (n= 26); and others (n= 4). The technical success rate was 100% for intracranial aneurysm obliteration and extracranial carotid artery stent placement, and 95% for those undergoing intracranial or vertebral artery stent placements; and partial or complete recanalization was achieved in 72% of patients undergoing intra-arterial thrombolysis. After adjusting for procedural type, the actual adverse event rate of 3% compared favorably with the predicted rate of 7% based on the results of clinical trials.
Conclusions:
We provide estimates of procedure volumes and outcomes observed in the initial phase of setting up a neuroendovascular service with an active training program.
