title: Pathologic validation of clot length determined using thin section non-contrast CT.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Recent studies have demonstrated that in acute ischemic stroke patients, thin section non-contrast CT (NCCT) can be used to determine the length of the hyperdense intracranial thrombus, and that clot length using this approach predicts the likelihood of vessel recanalization after intravenous tissue plasminogen activator.
  
  
  METHODS
  An acute ischemic stroke patient presented with a left middle cerebral artery occlusion and underwent emergent catheter based therapy. Clot length was determined using pretreatment thin section NCCT and was independently confirmed by the pathologist after whole clot extraction.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The concordance between the NCCT measured clot length and the pathological examination in this case provides additional support for the accuracy of using thin section NCCT data to determine clot length in all patients.
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiology, Division of Interventional Neuroradiology, Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA. ajyoo@partners.org
authors.forename: Albert J
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: Yoo
authors.forename: Thabele M
authors.initials: TM
authors.lastname: Leslie-Mazwi
authors.forename: Christian H
authors.initials: CH
authors.lastname: Riedel
authors.forename: Ronil V
authors.initials: RV
authors.lastname: Chandra
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D020244:Infarction, Middle Cerebral Artery / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000628:therapy*; D061330:Multidetector Computed Tomography / Q000592:standards*; D015424:Reperfusion / Q000592:standards; D015203:Reproducibility of Results