Thursday, July 07, 2011

Canada also has trouble with time

The current theme of this blog revolves around getting help and getting help fast if you see any stroke signs or symptoms.

And that means any sign.

This research helps show that need is not United States-specific. I bolded the last item on a longer list of findings, emphasizing the need to be sure to get help quickly. Research in Canada, too, shows that stroke victims wait too long for treatment:
Stroke victims arriving at Canadian hospitals aren't being treated quickly enough, creating "unacceptable" delays that are increasing the risk of irreversible and devastating brain damage, according to a major new study.

The finding is part of the wider problem, highlighted in the study, that strokes aren't being treated like the medical emergencies they are by the tens of thousands of Canadians who suffer them each year.

It's based on a national review of hospital records and data representing more than 38,000 patients admitted with stroke across the country in 2008-09.

The audit by the Canadian Stroke Network, the first of its kind in this country, found: ...

- 39 per cent of all patients arrived at the hospital more than 12 hours after their first symptom of a stroke; ...

3 comments:

Linda said...

I don't have statistics for you but an issue my stroke friends and I have discussed is that not all hospitals around here have the expertise or are able to do the imaging required to decide if the clot buster drugs are appropriate.

We hear of scenario after scenario where someone feels awful for several hours of precious time before a family member decides to drive them to the closest emergency room. Then after a delay being seen the person needs to be transferred to a different hospital or it is assessed that it is now too late for the clot buster anyway.

The best thing to do is to call an ambulance and let them take you rapidly to the appropriate hospital in the first place, or, at the very least, be aware of the capabilities of the hospitals near you.

Jeff Porter said...

Thanks, Linda, for the excellent point of getting to the appropriate hospital by ambulance. Does Canada keep a central list of hospitals equipped for stroke patients?

And the next posting will address ambulance vs. private transportation!

TransformingTim said...

I hope God continues to guide you through your stroke recovery. Please feel free to stop by my stroke resource and make a suggestion. What is a Stroke? Take care!