The Mechanical Embolus Retrieval in Cerebral Ischemia, or MERCI retriever, is a recently developed approach to remove or break up blood clots that have wandered into a small blood vessel causing it to become occluded. This is done by carefully passing a special device from a blood vessel in the leg all the way into the blood vessel in the brain where the blood clot is trapped. The retriever captures the clot and pulls it out of the body, thus returning blood flow to the affected area.
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