Subj : OT: Question about "clotbusters"
To   : alt.tv.er
From : ALIDA SPRY
Date : Mon Sep 12 2005 15:19:42

From Newsgroup: alt.tv.er

Hello all,

I'm usually just a lurker but I was wondering if some of the doctors here 
could tell me if/ when clotbusters are used for stroke patients and when 
would they not be used.  The reason for my question is that my father just 
passed away on August 16 and he had a stroke only a few days before.  I'm 
wondering about the care and treatment he was given (or lack of I should 
say).  He happened to be talking to my brother on his cell phone at the time 
of the stroke and he started coughing a lot then he got back on the phone 
and my brother noticed his speech was slurred so he called me to go check on 
my dad who happened to be right down the street from my house getting 
something to eat at the time.

Anyway, I drove right over and he was in his car and actually tried to drive 
but he went over the median in the parking lot and tapped a parked car while 
I was approaching.  He was alert and asking what happened but he was 
drooling a little and he couldn't move his left side.  So some people there 
called 911 and he was taken to the local hospital.  I had to wait for the 
police because the guy whose car my dad hit was being a jerk and wanted to 
file a police report even though there was nothing wrong with his car and 
even the cop told him it wasn't a reportable incident because it was a 
medical situation.  Anyway, I would guess that from the time of the onset of 
the stroke to arrival at the hospital it was maybe half an hour at most. 
Anyway, we waited for at least 20 minutes before we could even go in to see 
him in the ER and then they did a CAT scan and a chest X-ray and we were 
told to wait for the cardiologist to come in to review them (it was a Friday 
night so apparently she wasn't there?).

Well, I'd say at least an hour if not more went by and my brother and I got 
impatient of waiting for someone to tell us what the heck was going on so we 
finally went out to the nurses station to ask when the doctor was going to 
get there and we were told that she wasn't even coming in but had told them 
to give my dad aspirin and a blood thinner (I think it was Plavix or 
something like that). He was coughing so much though that he nearly 
aspirated the aspirin tablet so the nurse threw the blood thinner tablet in 
the trash!  He didn't get an injectable blood thinner (Heprin) until 
sometime after he was finally moved up to the ICU which was like 1:30 or 
2:00 in the morning. (The stroke happened at about 7:40pm.)

There were MANY other things that bothered me about his care but the thing 
that keeps nagging at me is that I've always heard that the sooner you get 
the stroke victim to the hospital, the better it is because the clotbusters 
are supposed to be given in the first 1-3 hours.  Now, I'm not a doctor and 
it's hard to think clearly when it's your loved one lying on that gurney, 
but while we were there I kept thinking they'll give him something because 
they know what they're doing so then why do I feel like they should have 
done something more?

I'd appreciate any insight anyone can offer on the standard protocol for the 
use of clotbusters.

Thanks for reading and sorry it's such a long post.

Alida

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