FLORIDA : Doctors Leery of Using Stroke Drug

A year and a half after its approval, surveys show many doctors are still afraid to use a clot buster as the first emergency treatment for strokes because of the potential dangers. The slow acceptance of tissue plasminogen activator (TPA) was one of the primary topics of discussion at the American Heart Assn.’s 23rd International Joint Conference on Stroke and Cerebral Circulation, which was held in Orlando. The Food and Drug Administration approved TPA in June 1996. Given within three hours of the first symptoms, the medicine can dissolve the clot that blocks blood to the brain and stop the stroke. Initial studies showed this could reduce the risk of permanent paralysis and other stroke effects by 30% to 40%. However, patients must undergo a CT scan to make sure the stroke is not the result of bleeding inside the head rather than a clot. Given by mistake to someone with bleeding in the head, the treatment can be lethal. For this reason, many neurologists are leery about trying TPA.