Dr. Dorothea Altschul has been named Principal Investigator at The Valley Hospital in Ridgewood, New Jersey for a new study to look at patients treated for brain aneurysms.
Aneurysms occur when a weakened area within a blood vessel wall balloons outward. They are dangerous because they can burst and cause a life-threatening hemorrhage.
They often take the shape of a berry or balloon and surgeons have figured out that filling the aneurysm with tiny metal coils can prevent them from bursting.
Dr. Altschul specializes in this kind of minimally invasive procedure, called coiling, that can be done through a small incision in the leg.
Dr. Altschul’s study at Valley is part of a larger phase four clinical trial that will be looking at post market data on the Penumbra Coil 400 (PC 400) System. This system is one of several coiling devices used today and the trial aims to further evaluate this particular device’s efficacy. According to Penumbra, “This system is constructed of 92% Platinum and 8% Tungsten round wire with a diameter approximately 0.0015in ± 0.0001in.” The trial will recruit approximately 2,000 patients at about 100 centers across the United States.
You can learn more about this study at clinicaltrials.gov.
