Endovascular Therapy For Cerebrovascular Injuries After Head And Neck Trauma

Cerebrovascular injuries after blunt or penetrating head and neck trauma often lead to significant disability from ischemic stroke, hemorrhagic stroke and uncontrolled extracranial hemorrhage. Trauma causes carotid or vertebral dissection, occlusion, pseudoaneurysm, arteriovenous fistula, vessel transection, traumatic epistaxis, venous sinus thrombosis and carotid cavernous fistula. The rapid development of neuroendovascular techniques over the past two decades has led to effective therapies for each of these injuries. Controlled lesion embolization may use coils, liquid embolics (onyx or n-butyl cyanoarcrylate), polyvinyl alcohol particles or detachable balloons; there is stent angioplasty with uncovered, overlapping and covered stents or mechanical thrombolysis using stent-retrievers or aspiration catheters and the use of balloon occlusion tests and supraselective angiography to delineate safety of vessel sacrifice and to diagnose occult lesions respectively. Furthermore, the proliferation of stroke centers has increased local availability of rapid neuroendovascular expertise at many major trauma centers. Neuroendovascular therapies are less invasive than surgery, can often preserve the injured parent vessels and aid in treating conditions where surgery may be limited. In the absence of randomized controlled trials we present a narrative review of current endovascular therapeutic applications for each of these injuries. This expands the therapies at trauma teams' disposal in the continued effort to control bleeding, reduce secondary injury and prevent disability after trauma. Further research is necessary to inform the role of endovascular techniques after trauma. In particular, comparative studies are necessary to quantify the risk and benefits in conditions where surgical options also exist.