Intracranial Angioplasty and Stenting for Cerebrovascular Disease Lotfi Hacein-Bey, MD a, * , Panayiotis N. Varelas, MD, PhD b a Departments of Radiology and Neurosurgery, Loyola University Medical Center, 2160 South First Avenue, Maywood, IL 60153, USA b Henry Ford Hospital, Detroit, MI, USA As with many concepts in medicine, the terms, ‘‘stent’’ and ‘‘stenting,’’ have had a convoluted process of consecration. Charles Stent (1807–1885), an En- glish nineteenth-century dentist, is remembered for his contributions to the field of denture making, in particular the addition of stearine to improve the stability and plasticity of existing dental impressions materials and the use of talc as a filler and coloring agent of dentures and dental prostheses. ‘‘Stent- ing’’ first was used to describe the action of stiffening garments. In medicine, a stent is defined as ‘‘an expandable wire mesh or a hollow perforated tube which is inserted in a hollow structure of the body to keep it open.’’ Therefore, the word ‘‘stenting,’’ which now designates the use of me- chanical devices to overcome diameter reductions in human ducts, is some- what out of place in relation to its initial use. A review of stents for the treatment of arterial disease must start with a mention of balloon angio- plasty, which was developed in the 1970s by Andreas Gruentzig in Zurich, Germany, and gradually gained wide acceptance, as many trials demon- strated its effectiveness, and, in many cases, its superiority compared with surgery in various organ systems [1]. The issue of restenosis, however, which have been amply documented in the coronary, renal, and peripheral circulations, has continued to generate debate as to the long-term effectiveness of angioplasty [2]. That naturally led to the development of vascular stents. The first device to be used extensively in the vascular system was the balloon-mounted Palmaz-Schatz stent (Johnson & Johnson, Warren, New Jersey) [3]. * Corresponding author. E-mail address: lhaceinbey@lumc.edu (L. Hacein-Bey). 0733-8619/06/$ - see front matter Ó 2006 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.ncl.2006.06.004 neurologic.theclinics.com Neurol Clin 24 (2006) 697–713