Embodiments provide for a method for eliminating pathological sequences in a serial bit stream. Parallel data words having a first bit length are received. The received data words may be analyzed for a pathological sequence. If a pathological sequence is present in a data word, the data word containing the pathological sequence may be segmented into data segments having bit lengths less than a pathological sequence. The data word may be reformatted by generating reformatted data words having a second bit length. The reformatted data words may contain at least one of the data segments and the second bit length is greater than the first bit length. The reformatting may be performed by adding framing bits to the segments to form the reformatted data words. The reformatted data words are transmitted in place of the data word containing the pathological sequence.