Patent ID: 7333848

Claim:
A system for evaluating a patient identified as having symptomatic vertebrobasilar disease (VBD), comprising: means for measuring blood flow at one or more sites distal to where disease may be expected to be present in the patient, including the basilar artery and the posterior cerebral arteries (PCAs); a processing element which is programmed to: classify the patient as appropriate for receiving only medical therapy if the measured basilar blood flow is above a specified basilar flow threshold; if the measured basilar blood flow is below the specified basilar flow threshold, accept a data input which specifies whether the configurations of the patient's posterior PCAs are normal or fetal; and, if the configurations of both PCAs are normal, classify the patient as appropriate for receiving only medical therapy if a measured blood flow through each PCA is above a specified PCA flow threshold, classify the patient as appropriate for receiving flow augmentation therapy if a measured blood flow through each PCA is below a specified PCA flow threshold, and classify the patient as borderline if a measured blood flow through only one PCA is below the specified PCA flow threshold and additional specified criteria indicating a need for flow augmentation are met.