A healthy dose of fatalism should accompany any patient experiencing the symptoms of stroke when presenting at an emergency room for treatment. Assuming the facility is not a stroke center, with enhanced diagnosis resources and treatment options for combating the effects of ischemic stroke, one’s prospects for full or partial recovery could well depend upon the confidence in and willingness of the E.R. physician to administer tissue plasminogen activator or "tPA," a thrombolytic agent, capable of recanalizing a passage through an arterial clot in the brain tissue.
Although the use of tPA is recommended by the American Heart Association as a first line treatment for ischemic stroke the use of the drug is controversial because of significant risk of inducing intracranial hemorrhage and other organic damage in a small but significant number of patients.
