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Updated: May 18, 2026

Minimally Invasive Thumb-sized Pterional Craniotomy for Surgical Clip Ligation of Unruptured Anterior Circulation Aneurysms
Published on: August 11, 2015
Management of distal posterior inferior cerebellar artery aneurysms
Rui-shen Lin1, Weiwei Wang, Aishu Guo
1Department of Neurosurgery, Zhangzhou Municipal Hospital, Zhangzhou, China. lrs_submit@sina.com
Background:
Most of the posterior inferior cerebellar artery (PICA) aneurysms arise at the vertebral artery-PICA junction; distal PICA aneurysms are rare. Their clinical features and treatments are not fully understood.
Methods:
This was a retrospective study. We reported 9 patients with the distal PICA aneurysms treated by surgical clipping or endovascular embolization in our neurosurgical center.
Results:
All patients experienced sudden onset of headache with subarachnoid hemorrhage. The location of PICA aneurysms was at the anterior-medullary (n = 4), tonsillomedullary (TM) (n = 1), and telovelotonsillar (n = 4). Surgical clipping was performed in 3 and endovascular coil in 6 patients. All the PICA aneurysms were occluded with parent artery preservation, and all of the patients achieved good recovery.
Conclusions:
Distal PICA aneurysm is exceptionally rare; it could be treated successfully with surgical clipping or endovascular treatments.
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