The ‘radical combined approach’ in cerebral arteriovenous malformation treatment: Technical note

Abstract

AVMs are vessel anomalies where a connection between arterial and venous systems is present and the capillary bed is absent between the two. AVMs tend to present with seizures, headaches, focal neurological deficits and hemorrhage. Hemorrhage is the most common form of presentation. AVM's have a 2–4% annual risk of hemorrhage. Certain studies report this rate as 1%. The greatest discussion in AVM treatment is whether to use interventional treatment or monitor with medical treatment. There are 3 modalities that can be used for interventional treatment; microsurgical resection, endovascular embolization and stereotactic radiosurgery. Combined techniques are also possible. We defined the ‘radical combined approach’ combines embolization and microsurgery. We will discuss this procedure in this article as we believe it has several advantages.