Getting stroke treatment fast can improve outcome
Copyright 2006 The Daily Oklahoman
By DIANE CLAY
The Daily Oklahoman (Oklahoma City, OK)
Safieh Marand’s son said his mom is lucky that when a stroke struck, it was on her 86th birthday.
Marand, who saved money in Tehran, Iran, to send her children to school in the United States, made it out of bed April 26 but quickly lost feeling on the right side of her body. She hunched in her closet and began to shake.
Marand lives alone, and her family said she would have collapsed on her closet floor unnoticed if her sister hadn’t been in town from Sweden for her birthday.
“That was a gift to us,” Ahad “Ed” Marand said.
Marand’s sister had difficulty using the telephone system but eventually was able to call Marand’s daughter, who called 911.
When an ambulance arrived, Marand’s family told medical technicians she had suffered the stroke about two hours earlier. The technicians misunderstood the family because of a language problem and took Safieh Marand to Edmond Medical Center with no lights flashing. Her son, who was following the ambulance, thought his mother had died.
When the Edmond emergency physician realized the stroke occurred two hours ago instead of 12, he returned Marand to the ambulance and rushed her to Mercy Health Center.
New stroke treatments are saving lives at Mercy and elsewhere, but treatment success depends on how fast patients get to the hospital.
Unfortunately, people are waiting 22 hours or more to get help after they notice the first symptoms. Six hours or under is preferred. The wait renders new techniques useless and almost guarantees a life of debilitating injury or death.
Marand was treated with a new technique for stroke-causing blockages called MERCI. The corkscrew attachment at the end of a catheter allows doctors to pull the blockage out of an artery when clot-busting drugs aren’t enough.
Two days after treatment, Marand was walking, talking and only seemed to suffer minor memory lapses that have since improved.
Ed Marand lived in the hospital with his mother for nearly two weeks to help with therapy and to translate.
“For two days, she was just looking at people. We thought we were going to lose Mom,” Marand, 51, said.
“Yesterday was a major improvement. She’s recovering so fast.”
The MERCI procedure costs about $7,000 and is covered by insurance, Medicaid and Medicare, hospital officials said.
There is a risk of bleeding and death with stroke treatments, including MERCI, but Dr. Vance McCollom said treatment significantly improves chances of survival.
“She probably would not have survived this stroke,” McCollom said of Marand. “I can’t think of anybody that would refuse treatment. The main problem is we don’t get patients here in time. Don’t sit around and wait. Time is brain. Each 10-15 minutes that goes by, you lose a lot more brain function.”
Ed Marand was so amazed by his mother’s recovery, he now calls McCollom “Little God.”
“When I was crying big time, I noticed tears in his eyes, also. He said, ‘I promise you I will take care of her like my own mother,’ ” Marand said.
Safieh Marand, who speaks little English, added in Persian, “Thank you God.”
Marand was discharged from the hospital May 10.