Percutaneous balloon angioplasty has been found to be useful for the treatm
ent of intracranial atherosclerotic arterial stenosis, Nonetheless, an ongo
ing risk of this procedure is arterial dissection, which increases the haza
rds of acute closure, stroke, and restenosis. Stenting of the intracranial
vasculature recently has been shown to be feasible in a variety of circumst
ances. To our knowledge, however, stenting of the middle cerebral artery ha
s not been possible until now primarily because of difficulty with tracking
stents across the carotid siphon. We describe the successful treatment of
a symptomatic middle cerebral artery stenosis achieved using a balloon-expa
ndable flexible coronary stent.