Manipal: A patient by name Bhayya (name changed) aged about 54 years hailing from Udupi reported to emergency department, Kasturba Hospital, Manipal on November 23 with intense weakness in right hand, right leg and with loss of speech. He reported within three hour of the onset of these symptoms. Immediately, CT scan was done and it showed a blood clot in left middle cerebral artery.
In the conventional approach, the patient suffering a stroke up to four and half hours is treated with Intravenous Thrombolysis where the medicine is injected into the veins and the medicine spreads across the body and it removes the blood clot. Since the patient was having a block in the major blood vessel supplying blood to brain, the doctors were not able to perform the process. In recent studies, it shows that intravenous thrombolysis is not that effective since the medicine spreads across the body and it may not fully remove the block.
The treating Neurologists decided to do highly specialised and advanced catheter based cerebral angiography. For any stroke case, standard of care worldwide is Intravenous Thrombolysis. But Catheter based cerebral angiography is the best solution for such blocked vessel. Dr Shankar Prasad Gorthi, Professor & Head, Department of Neurology, Kasturba Hospital, Manipal is specialized in Stroke and such treatment modalities. The patient’s artery was opened after catheter based cerebral angiography and administration of clot bursting drug by a team of doctors from Neurology & Radiology departments. The Neuro-Intervention procedure was performed by Dr Rajagopal, Head Dept of Interventional Radiology and Radiodiagnosis Kasturba Hospital Manipal. The patient was discharged on December 5 and has recovered well.
Dr (Col) M Dayananda, Medical Superintendent and COO, Kasturba Hospital Manipal congratulated the Neurologists at Kasturba Hospital, Manipal for performing catheter based cerebral angiography and treating successfully the patient who suffered the stroke.