Why Aren't Stroke Patients Getting Clot-Busting tPA Drug?
Many hospitals not equipped to rapidly administer powerful antidote
by Stacey Colino, AARP, June 26, 2018|Comments: 1
Of 61,698 eligible patients with acute ischemic stroke who arrived at a hospital within two hours of symptom onset, 25 percent were not treated with a drug that could clear clots within three hours, according to a study.
A stroke can be deadly — and if it doesn’t kill you, it can leave you with serious, often permanent, disabilities. So when a powerful clot-clearing drug called tPA (tissue plasminogen activator) was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in 1996, it was a game-changer in the treatment of ischemic strokes, which afflict about 795,000 people each year in the United States.
Fast-forward to today: Many tPA candidates are not getting the drug. In fact, of 61,698 eligible patients with acute ischemic stroke who arrived at a hospital within two hours of the onset of symptoms, 25 percent were not treated with tPA within three hours, according to a study in an October 2016 issue of Neurology. This is even though the American Stroke Association and American Heart Association strongly endorse giving tPA to eligible patients with acute ischemic stroke within three hours of the stroke’s onset.
https://www.aarp.org/health/conditions-treatments/info-2018/stroke-treatment-tpa-blood-clots.html?intcmp=AE-HEA-R1-C1-ART
