Some news to cheer us! Many more stroke patients than previously thought can be saved from disability or death if doctors succeed in removing blood clots that are choking off circulation to the brain, a new study has shown.
The striking results will have an immediate impact and save people from life-long disability or death.
The key findings is that there is often more time than doctors realised in which brain cells can be rescued by a procedure to remove the clot.
Traditional guide lines have set a limit of six hours after stroke symptoms begin and noted thatafter the period, it would be be too late to help. The new study showed that this time window could be expanded to 16 hours.
However, only half the people who were screened qualified for treatment known as ‘thrombectomy’, which uses a mechanical device to pull clots out of a blood vessel.The patients who had clots removed fared a lot better than those who did not.
_Deccan Herald-Health_