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How is surgery used to treat pulmonary embolism?
To improve blood flow, a blood clot can be removed during surgery. Or the clot might be removed with a less invasive procedure that uses a catheter (a thin tube that's guided through a blood vessel). This surgery or procedure is called an embolectomy.
An embolectomy is not common. But it may be done for a few reasons. These include:
- You can't have thrombolytic treatment.
- The clot is so dangerous that you can't wait for medicine to work.
- You've had thrombolytic treatment, but it hasn't worked well enough.
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