Ochsner Health System this week announced that its neurologists recently completed the 1000th patient consult in a burgeoning stroke treatment program for rural and understaffed hospitals.
Ochsner, amulti-hospital enterprise that serves a larger share of the patient base than any of its competitors in the New Orleans region, launched the Acute Stroke System for Emergent Regional Telestroke (ASSERT) program in 2009. The service uses technology to link vascular neurologists at Ochsner Medical Center to other hospitals that do not have vascular neurologists on call when a stroke victim arrives for treatment. ASSERT is intended to improve treatment in the critical hours after a blockage begins in a cerebral artery.
Via video, an Ochsner Medical Center specialist can observe a patient, assist in diagnosis and consult on how to proceed with thrombolytic therapy, the administration of drugs intended to break up blockages and resume oxygen flow to brain tissue. Thrombolytic therapy is the most common emergency treatment for ischemic stroke, which occur upon arterial blockages, as opposed to hemorrhagic stroke that occurs when a vessel bleeds into brain tissue.
Telemedicine is an expanding enterprise on the American health-care landscape, though Ochsner is the only Louisiana hospital to use the technology for emergency stroke care. To date, the ASSERT network includes 13 hospitals: Ochsner Baptist Medical Center in New Orleans; Ochsner Medical Center Baton Rouge; Ochsner Medical Center West Bank Campus; Ochsner St. Anne General Hospital in Raceland; Ochsner Medical Center Kenner; Ochsner Medical Center North Shore; Franklin Foundation Hospital in Franklin; St. Charles Parish Hospital in Luling, St. James Parish Hospital in Lutcher, St. Tammany Parish Hospital in Covington, Pointe Coupee General Hospital in New Roads and Lady of the Sea General Hospital in Cut Off. Christus St. Frances Cabrini in Alexandria will join the network in March 2012.
In the past, being in a rural area limited our ability to transfer our patients to Baton Rouge within the three-hour window required for (treatment), Dr. Brian LeBlanc of Lake Physician Group in New Roads said. Now, we have better outcomes, hands down.
Separately, Ochsner is developing a telemedicine network intended to link intensive care units acrossthesystem and, later, in non-Ochsner hospitals to a centralized control center staffed by physicians and nurses specially trained to treat critical care patients. Ochsner executives bill telemedicine not as an efficiency measure, pledging that its use does not reduce bedside, in-person care by medical professionals. Rather, the efforts are framed as a way to share expertise and allow patients better, more timely care closer to where they live.
Stroke is the fourth-leading cause of death in the United States and the leading cause of newly acquired disability in adulthood. Stroke caused 5.5 percent of deaths among Louisianians in 2008. Along with most other Deep South states, Louisianas mortality rate from strokes leads the rest of the nation. Associated risk factors rates of smoking among adults, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, obesity in Louisiana exceed national averages, while the state lags in positive health indicators such as frequency of exercise and fruit and vegetable intake.
New Orleans recently hosted the annual International Stroke Conference sponsored by the American Heart Association and American Stroke Association. The American Academy of Neurology comes to the city April 21-28 for its annual meeting, again bringing hundreds of clinicians and researchers to discuss treatment models, drug therapies, recovery issues and questions of public policy.
Bill Barrow can be reached at bbarrow@timespicayune.com.
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Ochsner program for remote stroke treatment surpasses 1,000-patient mark