Drug of benefit more than 3 hrs post stroke

The results of a study of alteplase, the active component of Genentech's Activase, suggest that stroke patients could still derive benefit from the drug more than three hours after an event, considered by physicians as the agent's useful limit. The research, which is published in The Lancet Neurology, was conducted by scientists at Australia's Royal Melbourne Hospital.

The team randomized 101 hospitalized patients to receive either alteplase or placebo between three and six hours after experiencing an acute ischemic stroke event. Three to five days later perfusion-weighted and diffusion weighted magnetic resonance images were taken to assess the impact of treatment, with a subsequent T2-weighted MRI assessment being conducted after 90-days.

The mean rate of infarct growth in the alteplase group was 1.24 compared with 1.78 in the placebo arm, while the relative level of infarct growth in the two groups was 1.18 and 1.79, respectively.The researchers said that, while alteplase was associated with an improved neurological outcome, the relatively low number of patients involved in the program meant that the result was not statistically significant.