High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles In medicine, an embolism (plural embolisms; from the Greek ἐμβολισμός "insertion") is the event of lodging of an embolus (a detached intravascular mass capable of clogging arterial capillary beds at a site far from its origin) into a narrow capillary vessel of an arterial bed which causes a blockage (vascular occlusion) in a distant part of the body.