Robert Willinsky
Dr. Robert Willinsky is the JDMI neuroradiology Division Chief.
He is Professor of Medical Imaging at the University of Toronto. Dr. Willinsky studied medicine at the University of Western Ontario. After a rotating internship, he was engaged in a family practice in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario.
Dr. Willinsky did his residency in radiology at the University of Toronto followed by a fellowship in interventional neuroradiology in Paris, France under the tutelage of Professor Pierre Lasjaunias. He had a staff position in medical imaging at Sunnybrook Health Sciences in Toronto and moved to the Toronto Western Hospital in 1989 to work with Dr. Karel terBrugge.
He has served as the Chief of the Oral Examination Board (English component) in Medical Imaging for the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada. He has been program director of the University of Toronto Neuroradiology Fellowship program.
Dr. Willinsky’s academic career has focused on cerebrovascular diseases. He has more than 170 peer-reviewed publications and has been an invited speaker at more than 130 national/ international meetings. He has a passion for skiing in the Canadian Rockies and is an avid road cyclist.
- The presence of pachymeningeal hyperintensity on non-contrast flair imaging in patients with spontaneous intracranial hypotension
CONCLUSION: Where present, diffuse pachymeningeal hyperintensity can be accurately identified on a non-contrast FLAIR sequence in patients with […]
- Healthy Life-Year Costs of Treatment Speed From Arrival to Endovascular Thrombectomy in Patients With Ischemic Stroke: A Meta-analysis of Individual Patient Data From 7 Randomized Clinical Trials
CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE: In this study, care delays were associated with loss of healthy life-years in patients with acute ischemic stroke treated […]
- Intradural spinal varix: the "doughnut" sign on T 2 weighted MR and confirmation with gadolinium-enhanced arterial and blood pool MR angiography
Intradural spinal varices are rare lesions, with only three cases being previously reported in the literature. Previously described patients […]
- Intra-Arterial Therapy and Post-Treatment Infarct Volumes: Insights From the ESCAPE Randomized Controlled Trial
CONCLUSIONS: These results support the primary results of the ESCAPE trial and show that the biological underpinning of the success of endovascular […]
- Clinical course of untreated cerebral cavernous malformations: a meta-analysis of individual patient data
BACKGROUND: Cerebral cavernous malformations (CCMs) can cause symptomatic intracranial haemorrhage (ICH), but the estimated risks are imprecise and […]
- Natural history and management of basilar trunk artery aneurysms
CONCLUSIONS: BTAs natural histories may differ depending on subtype of aneurysm. Saccular aneurysms likely represent an underlying predisposition to […]
- Randomized assessment of rapid endovascular treatment of ischemic stroke
CONCLUSIONS: Among patients with acute ischemic stroke with a proximal vessel occlusion, a small infarct core, and moderate-to-good collateral […]
- Endovascular treatment for Small Core and Anterior circulation Proximal occlusion with Emphasis on minimizing CT to recanalization times (ESCAPE) trial: methodology
ESCAPE is a prospective, multicenter, randomized clinical trial that will enroll subjects with the following main inclusion criteria: less than 12 h […]
- Clinical characteristics and preferential location of intracranial mirror aneurysms: a comparison with non-mirror multiple and single aneurysms
CONCLUSION: Patients with mirror aneurysms had similar clinical characteristics to non-mirror multiple aneurysm patients. Mirror aneurysms showed a […]
- Natural history and outcome after treatment of unruptured intradural fusiform aneurysms
CONCLUSIONS: Nonatherosclerotic fusiform intradural aneurysms have a low risk of adverse outcome within the first few years after diagnosis and […]
- Management of dural carotid cavernous fistulas: a single-centre experience
CONCLUSIONS: In properly selected patients, endovascular embolisation, particularly by transvenous approach, represents a safe and effective […]
- Aneurysmal wall enhancement and perianeurysmal edema after endovascular treatment of unruptured cerebral aneurysms
CONCLUSIONS: Our study demonstrates the prevalence and some appreciation of the natural history of aneurysmal wall enhancement and perianeurysmal […]
- Transclival pseudomeningocele secondary to ecchordosis physaliphora: case report and literature review
We describe a 52-year-old woman who presented with meningitis secondary to a pseudomeningocele within the sphenoid sinus derived from a bony defect […]
- Factors determining the success of endovascular treatments among patients with spinal dural arteriovenous fistulas
CONCLUSIONS: Presence of antegrade flow toward the draining vein and injection of NBCA glue less than 30 % are associated with higher chance of […]
- Vessel wall MRI to differentiate between reversible cerebral vasoconstriction syndrome and central nervous system vasculitis: preliminary results
CONCLUSIONS: Preliminary results suggest that high-resolution contrast-enhanced vessel wall MRI may enable differentiation between reversible […]
- Persistant anterior falcine sinus: demonstration by CT angiography
No abstract
- Challenges in the management of ruptured and unruptured brainstem arteriovenous malformations: outcome after conservative, single-modality, or multimodality treatments
CONCLUSION: Brainstem arteriovenous malformations require individualized treatment decisions. Single-modality treatments with a reasonable chance of […]
- Intracranial dural arteriovenous shunts: transarterial glue embolization--experience in 115 consecutive patients
CONCLUSION: Transarterial glue embolization is a safe and effective method of primary treatment for intracranial DAVS, especially Borden type III […]
- Intrinsic arteriovenous malformation of the trigeminal nerve
No abstract
- Impact of individual intracranial arterial aneurysm morphology on initial obliteration and recurrence rates of endovascular treatments: a multivariate analysis
CONCLUSIONS: A detailed pretreatment analysis of morphological features of aneurysms may help to determine those aneurysms that are more prone to […]
- Clues to dural arteriovenous fistulas in patients with progressive dementia
No abstract
- Postoperative assessment of clipped aneurysms with 64-slice computerized tomography angiography
CONCLUSIONS: 64-MDCTA is a valuable technique to assess the presence of a significant postoperative remnant in single titanium clip application cases […]
- Spontaneous angiographic conversion of intracranial dural arteriovenous shunt: long-term follow-up in nontreated patients
CONCLUSIONS: DAVS is a dynamic disorder, which will show chronological progression. Spontaneous angiographic obliteration or conversion into an […]
- Subarachnoid hemorrhage in perivascular spaces mimicking brainstem hematoma
No abstract
- Middle ear aneurysm treated with an innovative, vessel-preserving, aneurysm-occluding stent
Middle ear aneurysms are rare and difficult to treat. An innovative, parent vessel-preserving, aneurysm occlusion stent is a treatment alternative. […]
- Multidisciplinary care of occipital arteriovenous malformations: effect on nonhemorrhagic headache, vision, and outcome in a series of 135 patients. Clinical article
CONCLUSIONS: Appropriate selection of patients with occipital AVMs for one or a combination of treatment modalities yields a significant decrease in […]
- Aggressive intracranial dural arteriovenous fistula presenting with cerebrospinal fluid rhinorrhea: case report
CONCLUSION: A dural arteriovenous fistula should be included in the differential diagnosis of underlying causes of increased intracranial pressure […]
- Direct imaging of the distal dural ring and paraclinoid internal carotid artery aneurysms with high-resolution T2 turbo-spin echo technique at 3-T magnetic resonance imaging
CONCLUSION: Direct visualization of the DDR as well as precise evaluation of paraclinoid aneurysm location with high-resolution 3-T MRI is possible. […]
- Clinical and angiographic long-term follow-up of completely coiled intracranial aneurysms using endovascular technique
CONCLUSIONS: Completely coiled aneurysms after endovascular embolization demonstrated good clinical outcome, and there was no bleeding episode after […]
- Symptomatic enlargement of an occluded giant carotido-ophthalmic aneurysm after endovascular treatment: the vasa vasorum theory
We describe a patient with a symptomatic left giant carotido-ophthalmic aneurysm who initially underwent coil embolization with subtotal […]