Only four of 28 hospitals in Southwestern Ontario can give stroke victims a clot-busting drug that could be critical to their recovery.
The lack of care delays treatment and has created a system one Strathroy man calls disgusting after his wifes treatment was pushed back about an hour she later died.
Helen Veale was 74-years-old when she awakened on an April morning, tried to stand up and collapsed, her face contorted. Her husband Jerry Veale suspected stroke and phoned 911. Paramedics arrived in minutes, debated whether to take her to Strathroy Middlesex General Hospital, just five minutes away, or Londons University Hospital, deciding on the former.
Forty-five minutes later doctors in Strathroy confirmed she has suffered a common stroke caused by a clot and that she had to be taken to London for treatment.
A procedure in London later failed and Helen Veale died 16 days later, leaving behind two grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.
Perhaps she would have died anyway but Jerry Veale is outraged stroke victims are subjected to delays because local hospitals cant care for them. Its absolutely disgusting, he told The Free Press Wednesday.
Any delay is a concern: Experts estimate two million neurons die each minute in the brain until a stroke caused by a clot is cleared with medication that can only be used in four stroke centres in a region that stretches from Lake Erie to Owen Sound and from Oxford County to Lake Huron.
At least one hospital is considering a push to get that capability, too.
We have been looking at the resources and talking with (regional health bureaucrats) to see what we need in order to become a stroke centre because we certainly are interested in providing that service for the people of Oxford County, said Jayne Menard, vice-president of patient care and chief nurse at Woodstock General Hospital.
Woodstock already has a system to share CT scans with London, the first critical assessment to determine whether a clot-buster is more likely to cause benefit than harm.
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Only handful of Southwestern Ontario hospitals can give stroke victims clot-busting drug