Surgical Indirect Revascularization For Symptomatic Intracranial Arterial Stenosis

The operation is a form of indirect revascularization or EC-IC bypass, performed under general endotracheal anesthesia, with intraoperative electroencephalographic monitoring. The surgery consists in the dissection and relocation of the superficial temporal artery (STA) and middle meningeal artery (MMA) branches, which are separated from their surrounding tissues under microscopic visualization and re-routed through a craniotomy to be placed intracranially in close proximity to the branches of the middle cerebral artery (MCA). The MCA branches are dissected in the arachnoid space and the STA and MMA are kept in position with microsutures to the arachnoid or MMA dural cuffs, maintaining close contact between the EC and MCA branches.