PRESS-NEWS.org - Press Release Distribution
PRESS RELEASES DISTRIBUTION

NEJM editorial: New studies about endovascular therapy for stroke represent paradigm shift

'Now even endovascular skeptics will be convinced,' writes Anthony Furlan, M.D., University Hospitals Case Medical Center

2015-04-17
(Press-News.org) CLEVELAND -- Anthony J. Furlan, MD, Chairman of Neurology and Co-Director of the Neurological Institute at University Hospitals (UH) Case Medical Center and Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, who writes an accompanying editorial for five studies about endovascular stroke therapy published simultaneously in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM.org April 17), says these randomized clinical trials represent a breakthrough in showing the benefits of endovascular therapy for acute ischemic strokes.

"Now even endovascular skeptics will be convinced," Dr. Furlan writes.

His editorial, entitled Endovascular Stroke Therapy: It's About Time, states that these trials demonstrate the therapy is highly beneficial in a "resounding fashion."

The studies compared endovascular therapy - administration of an intravenous clot-busting agent (tPA) followed by device removal of a clot blocking a brain artery - with the clot-busting agent IV tPA alone for the treatment of ischemic stroke.

Dr. Furlan says that these new studies should settle any lingering uncertainties that have existed over endovascular therapy (also known as intra-arterial therapy), especially since three studies in 2013 indicated the therapy was no more effective than IV tPA alone.

He attributes the difference in results in the new studies to three things: Superior surgical technology resulting in faster, more complete clearage of the blockage; heightened awareness of decreasing the amount of time between patient arrival in the emergency department to the start of the endovascular procedure, and improved neuroimaging criteria for selecting patients most likely to benefit from the therapy.

Dr. Furlan says these studies represent a paradigm shift reminiscent of the introduction of the clot-busting therapy IV tPA in the 1990s.

"However, a major difference between then and now is that a stroke infrastructure is already in place in many countries due to the introduction of tPA during the past 20 years. Now, our stroke systems must adapt to endovascular therapy."

As with tPA, only a small percentage of stroke victims will need endovascular therapy (about 10 percent), according to Dr. Furlan, and not every hospital can or should perform it. Every year, more than 795,000 people in the United States have a stroke, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"This therapy will have major implications for Emergency Medical Services (EMS) triaging decisions because endovascular candidates should now be directly transported to a Comprehensive Stroke Center whenever possible, as rapidly as possible."

"As a result of these studies, the real winners are our patients with devastating strokes," Dr. Furlan says.

Dr. Furlan is a leading authority on stroke and was the Principal Investigator for PROACT II (Prolyse in Acute Cerebral Thromboembolism Trial II) which established the proof of principle of intra-arterial thrombolysis beyond 3 hours. He was the North American Principal Investigator for the DIAS/DEDAS trials (Desmoteplase in Acute Ischemic Stroke). He chaired the NIH/NINDS Hospital Care of Acute Stroke Task Force in 1996 at the National Symposium on the Rapid Identification and Treatment of Acute Stroke and was instrumental in establishing treatment time targets for IV tPA.

INFORMATION:

The studies published by the New England Journal of Medicine are referred to by the names MR CLEAN, EXTEND-1A, ESCAPE, SWIFT-PRIME and REVASCAT.

They are published on NEJM.org in conjunction with the European Stroke Organisation (ESO) Conference 2015 April 17 - 19 in Glasgow, UK. About University Hospitals University Hospitals, the second largest employer in Northeast Ohio with 25,000 employees, serves the needs of patients through an integrated network of 15 hospitals, 28 outpatient health centers and primary care physician offices in 15 counties. At the core of our $3.5 billion health system is University Hospitals Case Medical Center, ranked among America's 50 best hospitals by U.S. News & World Report in all 12 methodology-ranked specialties. The primary affiliate of Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, UH Case Medical Center is home to some of the most prestigious clinical and research centers of excellence in the nation, including cancer, pediatrics, women's health, orthopaedics, radiology, neuroscience, cardiology and cardiovascular surgery, digestive health, transplantation and genetics. Its main campus includes UH Rainbow Babies & Children's Hospital, ranked among the top children's hospitals in the nation; UH MacDonald Women's Hospital, Ohio's only hospital for women; and UH Seidman Cancer Center, part of the NCI-designated Case Comprehensive Cancer Center at Case Western Reserve University. For more information, go to http://www.uhhospitals.org



ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Engineer improves rechargeable batteries with MoS2 nano 'sandwich'

Engineer improves rechargeable batteries with MoS2 nano sandwich
2015-04-17
MANHATTAN, KANSAS -- The key to better cellphones and other rechargeable electronics may be in tiny "sandwiches" made of nanosheets, according to mechanical engineering research from Kansas State University. Gurpreet Singh, assistant professor of mechanical and nuclear engineering, and his research team are improving rechargeable lithium-ion batteries. The team has focused on the lithium cycling of molybdenum disulfide, or MoS2, sheets, which Singh describes as a "sandwich" of one molybdenum atom between two sulfur atoms. In the latest research, the team has found ...

UCLA demographer produces best estimate yet of Cambodia's death toll under Pol Pot

2015-04-17
The death toll in Cambodia under Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot was most likely between 1.2 million and 2.8 million -- or between 13 percent and 30 percent of the country's population at the time -- according to a forthcoming article by a UCLA demographer. April 17 is the 40th anniversary of the Khmer Rouge's capture of the capital of Cambodia -- beginning a four-year period that many consider to be a genocide. For decades, researchers have sought to pinpoint the death toll from political executions, disease, starvation and forced labor inflicted under the Khmer Rouge. Conventional ...

Self-affirmations may calm jitters and boost performance, research finds

2015-04-17
When the stakes are high, people in positions of low power may perform better by using self-affirmations to boost their confidence, according to new research published by the Society for Personality and Social Psychology. "Most people have experienced a time in their lives when they aren't performing up to their potential. They take a test or have a performance review at work, but something holds them back," says lead researcher Sonia Kang, Ph.D. "Performance in these situations is closely related to how we are expected to behave." The researchers conducted three experiments ...

Smokers underestimate risks of a few cigarettes

2015-04-17
Geneva, Switzerland, 17 April 2015 -- Many people still dangerously underestimate the health risks associated with smoking even a few cigarettes a day, despite decades of public health campaigning, French researchers have reported at the European Lung Cancer Conference (ELCC) in Geneva, Switzerland. The results demonstrate powerfully that the war against smoking is far from over, says oncologist Dr Laurent Greillier from Hopital Nord in Marseille, France, who presented the results at the conference. Greillier and colleagues analysed data from a representative survey ...

Should they stay or go? Study finds no harm when hospitals allow familes to observe CPR

2015-04-17
ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- When a hospital patient's heart stops, the drama starts, as doctors and nurses work furiously at resuscitation. And at many hospitals, that's the cue for someone to pull a curtain and hurry the patient's loved ones out of the room. But some hospitals allow those family members to stay, and watch the cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and other attempts to save the patient's life that the medical team makes. Now, a study has shown for the first time on a national scale that patients do just as well after a cardiac arrest at those hospitals, compared ...

Trial co-led by Pitt expert shows better function after stroke if clots removed

2015-04-17
PITTSBURGH, April 17, 2015 - A technique that removes blood clots from large brain blood vessels reduced disability after stroke in a trial conducted in Catalonia, Spain, and co-led by an expert from the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. The findings will be announced today at the annual meeting of the European Stroke Organisation in Glasgow, Scotland, and published online in the New England Journal of Medicine. The results of the trial, known as REVASCAT, echo findings from other recent large studies that were stopped early when the technique, called endovascular ...

Young women objectify themselves more browsing Facebook and magazines than media types

2015-04-17
Los Angeles, CA (April 17, 2015) Though it is widely believed that the media objectifies women, women further diminish themselves by constantly comparing their bodies to others'. Regardless of how much time young women devote to viewing television, music videos and using the internet, they will compare their appearances more frequently to photos in magazines and on Facebook, finds a new paper published today in Psychology of Women Quarterly. "Our research shows that spending more time reading magazines and on Facebook is associated with greater self-objectification among ...

A game-changer for stroke treatment

2015-04-17
Stroke is the leading cause of severe long-term disability in the United States, and less than 40 percent of patients who experience the most severe form of stroke regain functional independence if they receive the standard drug intervention alone. Now a study by an international group of stroke physician-researchers has found that removal of the clot causing a severe stroke, in combination with the standard medication, improves the restoration of blood flow to the brain and may result in better long term outcomes. The findings of the Swift Prime trial (Solitaire With ...

Effectiveness of new stroke treatment confirmed

2015-04-17
A research paper published in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) today confirms earlier findings that a procedure called endovascular therapy (ET) for ischemic stroke is the best treatment option for many patients by reducing the incidents of disability. This is the fourth research paper published this year that confirms the efficacy of the treatment. "Endovascular treatment using stent retrievers will become the standard of care for patients with acute ischemic stroke" says Dr. Mayank Goyal, University of Calgary, Cumming School of Medicine, Hotchkiss Brain Institute ...

Evidence grows that melanoma drugs benefit some lung cancer patients

2015-04-17
Geneva, Switzerland, 17 April 2015 -- A subset of lung cancer patients can derive important clinical benefits from drugs that are more commonly used to treat melanoma, the authors of a new academic clinical trial in Europe have reported at the European Lung Cancer Conference (ELCC) in Geneva, Switzerland. Dr. Oliver Gautschi, a medical oncologist from Lucern Cantonal Hospital in Switzerland, presented the results of the retrospective EURAF cohort study, which included lung cancer patients whose tumours carried specific mutations in the BRAF gene. The study was conducted ...

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:

Individuals with multiple sclerosis face substantially greater risk of hospitalisation and death from COVID-19, despite high rates of vaccination

Study shows obesity in childhood associated with a more than doubling of risk of developing multiple sclerosis in early adulthood

Rice Emerging Scholars Program receives $2.5M NSF grant to boost STEM education

Virtual rehabilitation provides benefits for stroke recovery

Generative AI develops potential new drugs for antibiotic-resistant bacteria

Biofuels could help island nations survive a global catastrophe, study suggests

NJIT research team discovering how fluids behave in nanopores with NSF grant

New study shows association of historical housing discrimination and shortfalls in colon cancer treatment

Social media use may help to empower plastic surgery patients

Q&A: How to train AI when you don't have enough data

Wayne State University researchers uncover potential treatment targets for Zika virus-related eye abnormalities

Discovering Van Gogh in the wild: scientists unveil a new gecko species

Small birds spice up the already diverse diet of spotted hyenas in Namibia

Imaging detects transient “hypoxic pockets” in the mouse brain

Dissolved organic matter could be used to track and improve the health of freshwaters

Indoor air quality standards in public buildings would boost health and economy, say international experts

Positive associations between premenstrual disorders and perinatal depression

New imaging method illuminates oxygen's journey in the brain

Researchers discover key gene for toxic alkaloid in barley

New approach to monitoring freshwater quality can identify sources of pollution, and predict their effects

Bidirectional link between premenstrual disorders and perinatal depression

Cell division quality control ‘stopwatch’ uncovered

Vaccine protects cattle from bovine tuberculosis, may eliminate disease

Andrew Siemion to receive the SETI Institute’s 2024 Drake Award

New study shows how the Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever virus enters our cells

Neoadjuvant chemotherapy proves effective for locally advanced penile squamous cell carcinoma

Study flips treatment paradigm in bilateral Wilms tumor, shows resistance to chemotherapy may point toward favorable outcomes

Doctors received approximately $12.1 billion from drug and device makers between 2013-2022

Discovery suggests new strategy against follicular lymphoma

Making the future too bright: how wishful thinking can point us in the wrong direction

[Press-News.org] NEJM editorial: New studies about endovascular therapy for stroke represent paradigm shift
'Now even endovascular skeptics will be convinced,' writes Anthony Furlan, M.D., University Hospitals Case Medical Center