English
ItalianoBrain Flow Team is a multidisciplinary group for CCSVI born in 2010. To date, the Team has the greatest experience worldwide in the interventional treatment of CCSVI patients.
Dr. Lupattelli and his Brain Flow Team are based in Rome, at the Research Cardiological Institute GVM Sanità. Team Brain Flow was born in April 2012 by the union of different specialists with the aim to diagnose and treat CCSVI. The team further purpose is to conduct scientific research aimed to definitively validate the CCSVI as a real nosological entity (and likely bounded with multiple sclerosis) as well as to prove its existence in other neurodegenerative diseases. The team is also widely involved in the evaluation of clinical outcomes following treatment of the affected veins by percutaneous balloon angioplasty (PTA).
The first to take care of CCSVI patients was Dr. Tommaso Lupattelli, interventional radiologist and vascular surgeon who in September 2010, began to treat the first patient at Villa Salus in Reggio Emilia, Italy. He graduated in CCSVI diagnosis and treatment at University of Ferrara in 2011. Subsequently, two sonographers, Dr. Giovanni Bellagamba and Dr. Elena Righi became part of the group. In 2012, the team was finally joined by 3 neurologists, Dr Paolo Onorati, Dr.Christian Marcotulli and Dr Claudio Babiloni. Currently these multidisciplinary team is made by radiologists and neuroradiologists , vascular surgeons , cardiologists, sonographers, neurologists and many others (posturologist, medical engineer, dietician, etc.). Currently, Brain Flow Team is one of the the most experienced team for the diagnosis and treatment of CCSVI in the world with a total of 5000 Color Doppler ultrasounds and about 2400 interventional procedures already performed.
The Brain Flow team has progressively developed the technique of Prof Zamboni (the so called liberation treatment), improving it significantly in several aspects. The team also carry out accurate assessments of CCSVI patients by EEG prior to and after angioplasty. Some relevant studies on EEG results are due to be published in the medical literature soon. Team Brain Flow is also involved in different experimental projects designed to assess the effectiveness of endovascular surgery in patients with CCSVI and multiple sclerosis. Recently, a feasibility and safety study on CCSVI treatment conducted in a cohort of 1202 patients has been reported by Dr. Tommaso Lupattelli and his colleagues. The study, which is the greatest study ever reported in the medical literature in terms of number of CCSVI subjects treated, concluded that the percentage of major and minor complications are extremely low after angioplasty, particularly when the interventional radiologist has completed his surgical learning curve (at least 400 cases performed). Of importance, clinical results of the procedure seem strongly related to the interventional radiologist experience in CCSVI treatment.
