Trials in thrombectomy for acute ischemic stroke: Describing the state of clinical research in the field.

BACKGROUND: Endovascular thrombectomy has revolutionized treatment of ischemic stroke. Given the clinical and socioeconomic support for thrombectomy, new devices, procedures, and pharmaceuticals have emerged in recent years, and have been subject to a growing number of clinical trials worldwide. OBJECTIVE: To define the current state of thrombectomy clinical trials, highlight recent trends, and help guide future research in this area. METHODS: Current and previous clinical trials involving thrombectomy for ischemic stroke were queried from the Clinicaltrials.gov database. Trials were categorized by their current status, study design, funding type, exclusion criteria, study phase, enrollment, start and completion dates, country of origin, item of investigation, outcome metrics, and whether a peer-reviewed publication was linked to the trial. RESULTS: Querying the ClinicalTrials.gov registry yielded 196 trials, of which 161 (82.1 %) were started within the past 5 years. The average time to completion was 30.6 months. A total of 62 studies (31.6 %) examined the safety or efficacy of a thrombectomy device, 29 (14.8 %) investigated a pharmacological intervention alone or in combination with a device, 59 (30.1 %) examined aspects of the endovascular procedure on patient outcomes, and 14 (7.2 %) examined diagnostic utility during thrombectomy. Most trials were funded by academic centers (53.1 %) or industry (34.7 %). Although the United States contributed the most studies overall (59; 30.1 %), studies from European and Asian countries have been increasing since 2015. CONCLUSION: These trends indicate an increasing number of trials starting the past few years, with most occurring in Europe and examining devices or aspects of the thrombectomy procedure.

Endoscopic removal of recurrent colloid cysts.

OBJECTIVE: Removal of colloid cysts of the third ventricle using a purely endoscopic method has been established as a safe and advantageous technique. It is hypothesized that endoscopic removal in recurrent cases might pose more technical challenges and result in less success. The objective of this study was to assess the feasibility and outcomes of using a purely endoscopic approach for the management of recurrent colloid cysts compared to primary cysts. METHODS: A retrospective cohort study was performed on patients who underwent purely endoscopic removal of their colloid cyst. Descriptive statistics were compared for patients undergoing surgery for a recurrent cyst and those for a control cohort undergoing surgery for a primary cyst. Bivariate analysis was conducted using a Fisher's exact test for categorical variables and Mann-Whitney U-test for continuous variables. RESULTS: In total, 121 patients had a primary colloid cyst endoscopically removed and 10 patients had a total of 11 recurrent cysts removed. Recurrence or progression after surgery occurred in 3 (2.5%) cases in the primary cyst group and 2 (18.2%) cases in the recurrent cyst group. Symptomatic presentation during the follow-up period occurred in 6 (54.5%) cases in the recurrent cyst group versus 75 (62%) cases in the primary cyst group (p = 0.749). Two patients (20%) in the recurrent group had a second recurrence in a mean period of 30 months (1 patient at 15 and 1 patient at 45 months). One of these patients required a tertiary endoscopic removal 8 years after the second resection. No immediate postoperative complications or new morbidities were observed after repeat endoscopic surgery. The authors' findings indicated a nonsignificant trend toward a higher recurrence rate (18.2% vs 2.5%, p = 0.055) and a decreased proportion of complete removal (90.9% vs 81.8%, p = 0.296) in the recurrent cyst group compared to the primary cyst group. However, a significantly higher rate of preoperative hydrocephalus was observed in the primary cyst group compared with the recurrent cyst group (63.6% vs 18.2%, p = 0.007). CONCLUSIONS: Purely endoscopic approaches for the removal of recurrent colloid cysts of the third ventricle are feasible and equally safe compared with endoscopic removal of primary cysts. The study's findings did not show a statistically significant difference in the rate of recurrence between the 2 groups. The proportion of patients with symptomatic cysts on presentation was lower in patients with recurrent cysts than in patients with primary cysts. Due to the high rate of complete removal with negligible morbidity, the authors continue to advocate for an endoscopic removal at the time of cyst recurrence.