Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Time is still an issue

Time, as I've written for this blog time and time again, is key to stroke recovery.

Yet, we get depressing news about how stroke victims arrive to hospital late for drug therapy:
The CDC researchers found that almost 44 percent of patients who had strokes between 2005 and 2010 took more than 4.5 hours to get to the emergency room after their first symptoms.
That's up from the almost 40 percent who hesitated before going to the hospital in 2005.
At the same time, the percentage of stroke victims who got to the hospital within two hours also decreased — from 40 percent in 2005 to 35 percent in 2010 — another sign that people may not understand the need to get prompt medical care.
About 795,000 Americans suffer a stroke each year, according to the CDC. The most common type (87 percent of all strokes) is ischemic stroke, caused by a blockage in the blood flow to the brain.
You must get to help. Is that a guarantee? No. But it certainly increases your chance of positive outcome.

1 comment:

oc1dean said...

This really points out the major problem with initial stroke therapies right now. There is nothing besides tPA that the doctors can give you to stop the cascade of neuronal death. They call it neuroprotection and have 1000 failures from rats/mice tests that worked. Draculin might be the closest right now, edaravone approved in Japan(since 2001),a mild benefit for citocoline.