Advance hospital notification by EMS in acute stroke is associated with shorter door-to-computed tomography time and increased likelihood of administration of tissue-plasminogen activator.

摘要

BACKGROUND: Rapid brain imaging is a critical step in facilitating the use of intravenous (IV) tissue-plasminogen activator (tPA) or catheter-based thrombolysis. We hypothesized that advance notification by emergency medical services (EMS) would shorten emergency department (ED) arrival-to-computed tomography (CT) time and increase the use of IV and intra-arterial thrombolysis, even at a tertiary care stroke center with high baseline rates of tPA use. METHODS: We analyzed data on all acute stroke patients transported from March 2004 to June 2005 by EMS from the scene to our facility arriving