Mechanical Thrombectomy in Anticoagulated Patients With Acute Ischemic Stroke: A Meta-Analysis

According to a previous studies, mechanical thrombectomy(MT) is safe for anticoagulated patients. However, the safety and prognosis of direct oral anticoagulants (DOACs) and vitamin K antagonists (VKA) have not been compared with those of MT.This meta-analysis aimed at determining the efficacy of DOACs or VKA for patients after MT.

We searched PubMed, Embase, Web of Science databases, and Cochrane from their inception to Aug 2022. Revman 5.3 served for the meta-analysis. The meta-analysis included 12 studies that covered 3571 patients, finding that after MT treatment, DOACs significantly decreased the symptomatic intracerebral hemorrhage [odd ratio (OR)=0.49, 95% CI 0.30-0.80, P =0.004] and mortality (OR=0.63, 95% CI 0.48-0.83, P =0.001) compared with VKA. Meanwhile, no obvious differences were found between DOACs and VKA after MT treatment in terms of in any hemorrhagic transformation (OR=1.07, 95% CI 0.84-1.37, P =0.59), good functional outcome (OR=1.06, 95% CI 0.88-1.27, P =0.53), and successful arterial recanalization (OR=1.24, 95% CI 1.00-1.53, P =0.05).

This meta-analysis demonstrates that the application of DOACs in MT treatment for anticoagulated patients with acute ischemic stroke is safer than that in the VKA group. However, further studies are necessary to confirm these results.