Patent attributes
Methods and apparatus are provided for temporarily occluding a body lumen. A method in accordance with one or more embodiments of the invention includes introducing a tip of a catheter into the body lumen, the tip including a central longitudinal axis; expelling a thermosensitive polymer from the tip of the catheter into a portion of the body lumen, with at least a portion of the thermosensitive polymer being expelled from the tip in a direction generally radially outward from the central longitudinal axis to improve adherence of the thermosensitive polymer to a wall defining the body lumen; and at least partially withdrawing the tip from the body lumen and allowing the thermosensitive polymer to harden as it warms to body temperature to form a plug in the body lumen.
