Stroke, diabetic teens, COPD

Stroke: Save a minute, save almost two days

Stroke (2014) doi: 10.1161/STROKEAHA.113.002910

Rapidly restoring blood flow is crucial to ensure as many brain cells as possible survive after a stroke. However, intravenous tissue-type plasminogen activator (tPA) 'is the only medical therapy shown to improve patient outcomes in acute ischaemic stroke'. For example, compared to placebo, tPA thrombolysis increases a patient's chance of a disability-free recovery 2.6 fold when treatment starts within 1.5 hours of symptom onset. Starting tPA between 3 and 4.5 hours after symptoms emerge increases the chance of a disability-free recovery by 30%. Indeed, reducing the time between symptom onset and tPA by a minute may save two million neurones.