Levelland Covenant Hospital utilizes stroke tele-medicine to quickly treat patients with stroke symptoms.
Registered Emergency Room Nurse, Autumn Horne explained that the hospital recently used the tele-stroke machine to provide treatment suggested by a neurologist.
“It’s a device we’ve had for a little while actually, but when a patient comes in for stroke symptoms, we use this device to basically Facetime or Teladoc neurologists since we don’t have specialties here at our facility,” said Horne. “In this case, we had an elderly man come in and he had stroke symptoms.”
Covenant Hospital staff were able to begin quickly treating the patient with stroke symptoms before he was transferred to a stroke center with the use of the telestroke machine.
“In this case we had a gentlemen come in and he had stroke symptoms for a couple of hours, and we used the Teladoc device,” Horne said. “The neurologist asked us to give a medication called TNKase which helps bust up clots. We gave that medication and the symptoms resolved within 30 minutes. He was able to be transferred to the closest stroke center but the care that is required for stroke patients happens a lot faster when you have this device in our facility.”
Horne expressed the importance of Teladoc for treating medical conditions in rural communities.
“This device is super important in rural facilities like ours because we don’t have the specialties and it is 30 to 45 minutes to the closest stroke center which is Covenant in Lubbock,” Horne said. “We’re able to get those neurologists on the Teladoc and the telestroke to give us their recommendation here in this ER so we can start their treatment so much faster than if we take them to Covenant Medical Center.”
Horne explained that the neurologist has complete control of the telestroke machine and is able to see and speak with the patient virtually.
“It’s on a stand and on wheels. You roll it straight to the patient’s room. There’s a speaker and a camera and as soon as you call the hotline and say ‘hey, I have a stroke patient and this is what we’re gonna do’ they come in and talk to your patient,” Horne said. “They have full control of this whole thing. They give their best recommendation to the nurse and the ER physician that’s on and then from there we give those medications here or we transfer to a higher level of care.”
Horne stressed the importance of assessing stroke patients and beginning treatment while being accurate in a diagnosis. Previously, covenant emergency room physicians were responsible for assessing and treating stroke patients.
“It’s supposed to be a really quick process. If a patient comes in that has stroke symptoms we take them straight to CT, get that CT scan done and you immediately consult your neurologist and I think it takes a little bit of pressure off of the ER physician to try to make those calls,” Horne said. “It’s not their specialty; their specialty is emergency medicine, and these neurologists look at scans every day and they know the symptoms and they know the best treatment. They’re the experts in the field of strokes so we should consult them.”
Horne explained the process before being able to use the telestroke machine was similar but could result in treatment delays.
“Before, the process was similar but a little bit longer delay due to the fact that we didn’t have someone at the tip of our fingers to call up,” Horne said. “With a stroke patient, time is everything. The longer you wait to identify a stroke and treat the stroke the longer they are going to have deficits.”