Mechanical thrombectomy and the future of acute stroke treatment

After being staggered by numerous negative trials in 2013, the interventional stroke community saw four years of vindication for mechanical thrombectomy showing efficacy and safety, even beyond a hopeful 6-8 hour window out to 24 h. A landmark set of five trials in 2015 provided a foundation upon which years of incremental follow-ups, meta-analyses and new breakthroughs would be built. With optimized devices for thrombectomy and image analysis, the neurointerventional community has turned to workflow and systemization in this new era of acute ischemic stroke treatment. The aim of this review is to chronicle the evidence in the epoch of positive trials, synthesize ancillary studies to these, and discuss the imminent challenges that remain.