Fort Myers, Fla. - Lee Memorial is now one of only two hospitals nationwide to perform an advanced procedure to treat brain aneurysms where no incisions need to be made to the skull.

The surgery utilizes the "onyx" method of brain coiling to fix aneurysms which entails snaking a catheter through an incision of the groin, coiling through the femoral artery all the way to the brain. Because of the new onyx advancement, coiling has become available to more people.

The coil is attached to a wire that is stainless steel and the attachment is gold. Using electricity the wire is heated up which melts the gold and detaches the coil inside the aneurysm.

"They've just filled in (my) aneurysm with a material that hardens on the outside and stays soft on the inside," said Phyllis Welsh, who underwent the procedure last month.

One day Welsh went to Disney World, "After the ride I had a headache and felt sick to my stomach." A day later she woke up in the hospital, to find out she had an aneurysm.

Welsh was presented with two options: cut open her scalp with a traditional surgery, or the Onyx method with no incisions. Her obvious choice was the Onyx method.

But to perform the operation, Welsh's doctor Eric Eskioglu had to wait for approval from the FDA.

Just one week after surgery, Welsh was fully recovered and one of the first people to undergo the state-of-the art treatment in the entire nation.

"That's part of the reason we chose this procedure, because we were able to get back to our lives so quickly," said Welsh.

Dr. Eskioglu said 1.5 to 2 percent of people have aneurysms, and if one ruptures they should go immediately to the emergency room. Some main signs for ruptured aneurysms are a headache of a 12 on a 1-10 pain scale, nausea, vomiting and possibly unconsciousness.

Eskioglu said there are no screenings for aneurysms currently, and that they can been seen on MRI's or CatScans.