Is There an Age Gap in Intravenous Thrombolysis for Acute Ischemic Stroke?

Young adults received TPA more often than older patients and had better outcomes, but brain imaging and TPA administration were delayed more often.

Most patients presenting with ischemic stroke are older, so it would not be unreasonable to hypothesize that clinical practices and outcomes related to the use of intravenous tissue plasminogen activator (TPA) might differ in younger adults compared with older patients, for whom the baseline clinical suspicion for stroke may be higher.

Investigators analyzed data from the American Heart Association's Get With The Guidelines–Stroke registry to identify acute ischemic stroke patients between January 2009 and September 2015. Of the 1,320,965 patients included in this analysis, 30,448 (2.3%) were between 18 and 40 years old. Patients in this younger age group were more likely to receive intravenous TPA (12.5% vs. 8.8%) and had lower rates of sym…

Reviewing Author

Anthony S. Kim, MD

Disclosures

Grant/Research SupportNIH/National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke; NIH/National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences

Anthony S. Kim, MD

Disclosures

Grant/Research SupportNIH/National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke; NIH/National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences

Is There an Age Gap in Intravenous Thrombolysis for Acute Ischemic Stroke?

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Reviewing Author