MRI shows time of stroke

MRI makes the timing of strokes determinable

14.02.2012

Award for the development of a method that determines the timing of past strokes with the help of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). The Board of Trustees Martini Foundation donated the DR. MARTINI AWARD 2012 to the neurologist dr. Götz Thomalla from the University Hospital Hamburg-Eppendorf.

The neurologist had developed an MRI procedure with which the time of a recent stroke can be determined relatively accurately. For this purpose, Dr. Götz Thomalla with the renowned Dr. med. Martini Foundation, which has been awarded annually since 1883 on February 12, Erich Martinis, is awarded. The DR. MARTINI PRIZE, endowed with 3,000 euros, is Germany's oldest medical award and annually awards the best work done in Hamburg.

Temporal classification of strokes allows thrombolysis
Dr. Götz Thomalla was honored because he was able to prove that it is possible to use MRI to limit the time of a stroke, according to the announcement of the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf (UKE). Based on this time limit, patients who have a stroke while sleeping may also experience thrombolysis (dissolution of blood clots), the UKE reports. So far, they have been excluded from this treatment. Blood clots are the cause of strokes in most cases, closing off an artery in the brain and causing circulatory problems and damage in the affected brain regions. In thrombolysis, these blood clots are dissolved with the help of drugs to prevent further health consequences. However, thrombolysis is promising only in the first four and a half hours after the onset of the first symptoms. There „but 20 percent of strokes at night in sleep“ take place and remains completely unclear, „when it came to the stroke“, So far, many stroke patients have been excluded from thrombolysis. Thomalla at the award ceremony.

Significant progress in stroke therapy
Here, the MRI procedure of the Hamburg neurologist can remedy this situation by allowing a relatively accurate chronological classification of past strokes. „Dr. Thomalla's trial results represent significant advances in stroke therapy and open up new patient care perspectives“, The Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Dr. Martini Foundation and Director of the I. Medical Clinic at UKE, Professor Ansgar Lohse, founded the award ceremony. The scientific focus of the prizewinner lies in the imaging of cerebrovascular diseases (circulatory diseases of the brain) and the neurophysiology of diseases of the motor system. Dr. has especially distinguished himself Thomalla with the project „Selection of Patients for Intravenous Thrombolysis by Multimodal Stroke MRI Imaging (Perfusion and Diffusion Weighted MRI)“. (Fp)

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Picture: by-sassi