Researchers have developed a novel device that literally spins away the clots that block blood flow to the brain and cause strokes.
As Stanford explains in a blurb, the novel milli-spinner device may be able to save the lives of patients who experience “ischemic stroke” from brain stem clotting.
Traditional clot removal, a process known as thrombectomy, generally uses a catheter that either vacuums up the blood blockage or uses a wire mesh to ensnare it — a procedure that’s as rough and imprecise as it sounds. Conventional thrombectomy has a very low efficacy rate because of this imprecision, and the procedure can result in pieces of the clot breaking off and moving to more difficult-to-reach regions.
Thrombectomy via milli-spinner also enters the brain with a catheter, but instead of using a normal vacuum device, it employs a spinning tube outfitted with fins and slits that can suck up the clot much more meticulously.
Stanford neuroimaging expert Jeremy Heit, who also coauthored a new paper about the device in the journal Nature, explained in the school’s press release that the efficacy of the milli-spinner is “unbelievable.”
“For most cases, we’re more than doubling the efficacy of current technology, and for the toughest clots — which we’re only removing about 11 percent of the time with current devices — we’re getting the artery open on the first try 90 percent of the time,” Heit said. “This is a sea-change technology that will drastically improve our ability to help people.”
Renee Zhao, the senior author of the Nature paper who teaches mechanical engineering at Stanford and creates what she calls “millirobots,” said that conventional thrombectomies just aren’t cutting it.
“With existing technology, there’s no way to reduce the size of the clot,” Zhao said. “They rely on deforming and rupturing the clot to remove it.”
“What’s unique about the milli-spinner is that it applies compression and shear forces to shrink the entire clot,” she continued, “dramatically reducing the volume without causing rupture.”
Indeed, as the team discovered, the device can cut and vacuum up to five percent of its original size.
“It works so well, for a wide range of clot compositions and sizes,” Zhao said. “Even for tough… clots, which are impossible to treat with current technologies, our milli-spinner can treat them using this simple yet powerful mechanics concept to densify the fibrin network and shrink the clot.”
Though its main experimental use case is brain clot removal, Zhao is excited about its other uses, too.
“We’re exploring other biomedical applications for the milli-spinner design, and even possibilities beyond medicine,” the engineer said. “There are some very exciting opportunities ahead.”
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