Stroke

A blood test that measures lipoprotein(a) [Lp(a)] has received breakthrough device designation from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

The Tina-quant Lp(a) RxDx assay, developed by Roche in partnership with Amgen, is designed to identify adults with elevated Lp(a) levels who may benefit from lipid-lowering therapies currently in development. 

Lp(a) is a type of lipoprotein that is genetically inherited. Elevated levels have been associated with an increased risk for heart disease, stroke, and other blood vessel diseases.

Worldwide, about 1 in 5 people have high Lp(a) levels that are not significantly affected by lifestyle changes, such as diet and exercise. Elevated Lp(a) is particularly prevalent among women and people of African descent.

Lp(a) testing is “an important tool for clinicians, enabling them to make a more accurate assessment of [cardiovascular] risk, and it is expected to become a part of regular diagnostic testing in the coming years,” Roche said in a news release announcing the breakthrough designation for the Lp(a) blood test. 

If approved, the Tina-quant Lp(a) RxDx assay will be available on select Roche cobas platforms, the company reported.

Although low-density-lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol particles are much more abundant than Lp(a) particles and carry the greatest overall risk for heart disease, on a per-particle basis, atherogenic risk associated with Lp(a) is about six times higher than that associated with LDL cholesterol, a recent study showed.

There currently are no approved pharmacologic therapies to lower Lp(a) levels in the United States, but several hopefuls are in development. 

One is zerlasiran (Silence Therapeutics), a short interfering RNA (siRNA) agent, or “gene silencing” therapy, which binds to and temporarily blocks the action of the LPA gene, which encodes for apolipoprotein A, a dominant and rate-limiting component in the hepatic synthesis of the Lp(a) particle.

Treatment with zerlasiran produced significant and sustained reductions in Lp(a) concentrations in adults with elevated Lp(a) in the phase 1 APOLLO trial and the phase 2 ALPACAR-360 trial.

Other siRNA agents in development to lower Lp(a) levels include pelacarsen, lepodisiran, olpasiran, and muvalaplin.
 

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

A blood test that measures lipoprotein(a) [Lp(a)] has received breakthrough device designation from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

The Tina-quant Lp(a) RxDx assay, developed by Roche in partnership with Amgen, is designed to identify adults with elevated Lp(a) levels who may benefit from lipid-lowering therapies currently in development. 

Lp(a) is a type of lipoprotein that is genetically inherited. Elevated levels have been associated with an increased risk for heart disease, stroke, and other blood vessel diseases.

Worldwide, about 1 in 5 people have high Lp(a) levels that are not significantly affected by lifestyle changes, such as diet and exercise. Elevated Lp(a) is particularly prevalent among women and people of African descent.

Lp(a) testing is “an important tool for clinicians, enabling them to make a more accurate assessment of [cardiovascular] risk, and it is expected to become a part of regular diagnostic testing in the coming years,” Roche said in a news release announcing the breakthrough designation for the Lp(a) blood test. 

If approved, the Tina-quant Lp(a) RxDx assay will be available on select Roche cobas platforms, the company reported.

Although low-density-lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol particles are much more abundant than Lp(a) particles and carry the greatest overall risk for heart disease, on a per-particle basis, atherogenic risk associated with Lp(a) is about six times higher than that associated with LDL cholesterol, a recent study showed.

There currently are no approved pharmacologic therapies to lower Lp(a) levels in the United States, but several hopefuls are in development. 

One is zerlasiran (Silence Therapeutics), a short interfering RNA (siRNA) agent, or “gene silencing” therapy, which binds to and temporarily blocks the action of the LPA gene, which encodes for apolipoprotein A, a dominant and rate-limiting component in the hepatic synthesis of the Lp(a) particle.

Treatment with zerlasiran produced significant and sustained reductions in Lp(a) concentrations in adults with elevated Lp(a) in the phase 1 APOLLO trial and the phase 2 ALPACAR-360 trial.

Other siRNA agents in development to lower Lp(a) levels include pelacarsen, lepodisiran, olpasiran, and muvalaplin.
 

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

A blood test that measures lipoprotein(a) [Lp(a)] has received breakthrough device designation from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

The Tina-quant Lp(a) RxDx assay, developed by Roche in partnership with Amgen, is designed to identify adults with elevated Lp(a) levels who may benefit from lipid-lowering therapies currently in development. 

Lp(a) is a type of lipoprotein that is genetically inherited. Elevated levels have been associated with an increased risk for heart disease, stroke, and other blood vessel diseases.

Worldwide, about 1 in 5 people have high Lp(a) levels that are not significantly affected by lifestyle changes, such as diet and exercise. Elevated Lp(a) is particularly prevalent among women and people of African descent.

Lp(a) testing is “an important tool for clinicians, enabling them to make a more accurate assessment of [cardiovascular] risk, and it is expected to become a part of regular diagnostic testing in the coming years,” Roche said in a news release announcing the breakthrough designation for the Lp(a) blood test. 

If approved, the Tina-quant Lp(a) RxDx assay will be available on select Roche cobas platforms, the company reported.

Although low-density-lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol particles are much more abundant than Lp(a) particles and carry the greatest overall risk for heart disease, on a per-particle basis, atherogenic risk associated with Lp(a) is about six times higher than that associated with LDL cholesterol, a recent study showed.

There currently are no approved pharmacologic therapies to lower Lp(a) levels in the United States, but several hopefuls are in development. 

One is zerlasiran (Silence Therapeutics), a short interfering RNA (siRNA) agent, or “gene silencing” therapy, which binds to and temporarily blocks the action of the LPA gene, which encodes for apolipoprotein A, a dominant and rate-limiting component in the hepatic synthesis of the Lp(a) particle.

Treatment with zerlasiran produced significant and sustained reductions in Lp(a) concentrations in adults with elevated Lp(a) in the phase 1 APOLLO trial and the phase 2 ALPACAR-360 trial.

Other siRNA agents in development to lower Lp(a) levels include pelacarsen, lepodisiran, olpasiran, and muvalaplin.
 

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

Neuropsychiatric symptoms, including nightmares and hallucinatory “daymares,” may be a more important aspect of systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) than formerly recognized, according to a qualitative mixed methods study published in The Lancet Discovery Science’s eClinicalMedicine. The findings suggested these neuropsychiatric symptoms can sometimes present as prodromal and other times act as an early warning system for a forthcoming flare.

“For clinicians, the key point is to be aware that neurological and psychiatric symptoms are much more common in patients with lupus and other autoimmune systemic rheumatic diseases than previously thought,” lead author Melanie Sloan, PhD, of the Department of Public Health and Primary Care at the University of Cambridge in England, told this news organization.

“If clinicians — and some do already — could all ask about and document these symptoms for each patient, the usual progression of symptoms in a flare can then be monitored, and patients could be supported and treated at an earlier stage,” Dr. Sloan said. “Another key point is to consider systemic autoimmune diseases at an early stage if a patient presents with multiple seemingly unconnected symptoms, which often include both physical and mental health symptoms.”

Alfred Kim, MD, PhD, associate professor of medicine in rheumatology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri, noted the difficulty of determining what neuropsychiatric symptoms may be linked to lupus vs those occurring independently or as part of a different condition.

Dr. Kim

Study Details

In planning for the study, the researchers first searched the existing literature for studies involving neuropsychiatric symptoms in patients with systemic autoimmune rheumatic diseases (SARDs). “The literature indicated frequent underreporting and misattributions of neuropsychiatric symptoms in SLE and other SARD patients, and clinician-patient discordance in neuropsychiatric symptom attribution,” the authors reported.

During 2022-2023, the researchers conducted two surveys, one with 676 adult patients with SLE and one with 400 clinicians, recruited through social media, online patient support groups, and professional networks. All patients self-reported an SLE diagnosis that the researchers did not independently confirm. The patients were predominantly White (80%) and female (94%), ranging in age from 18 to over 70, with most falling between ages 40 and 69. Most patients lived in the United Kingdom (76%) or Europe (15%).

The clinicians included 51% rheumatologists, 24% psychiatrists, 13% neurologists, 5% rheumatology nurses, 3% primary care physicians, and 7% other clinicians. Nearly half of the clinicians (45%) were from the United Kingdom, with others from the United States or Canada (16%), Europe (17%), Asia (9%), Latin America (8%), Australia or New Zealand (3%), or elsewhere (3%).

The patient surveys asked whether they had experienced any of the 29 neuropsychiatric symptoms. For the symptoms that patients had experienced at least three times in their lives, the survey asked when they first experienced the symptom in relation to their SLE onset or other SLE symptoms: Over a year before, within a year of (on either side), 1-4 years after, or more than 5 years after onset/other symptoms. “Other quantitative data included timings of disrupted dreaming sleep in relation to hallucinations for those patients reporting experiencing these,” the authors wrote.

The researchers also conducted video conference interviews with 50 clinicians, including 20 rheumatologists, and 69 interviews with patients who had a systemic autoimmune rheumatic disease, including 27 patients with SLE. Other conditions among those interviewed included inflammatory arthritis, vasculitis, Sjögren disease, systemic sclerosis, myositis, undifferentiated and mixed connective tissue diseases, and polymyalgia rheumatica. During interviews, the term “daymare” was used to discuss possible hallucinations.
 

Linking Neuropsychiatric Symptoms and Disease

Four themes emerged from the analysis of the surveys and interviews. First, despite many rheumatologists stating that it was an “established theory” that most neuropsychiatric symptoms related to SLE would initially present around the time of diagnosis or disease onset, the findings from patients and interviews with psychiatrists did not align with this theory. The first presentation of each neuropsychiatric symptom only occurred around the onset of other SLE symptoms, about one fifth to one third of the time. In fact, more than half of the patients with SLE who had experienced hallucinations or delusions/paranoia said they occurred more than a year after they first experienced their other SLE symptoms.

Patient experiences differed in terms of whether they believed their neuropsychiatric symptoms were directly related to their SLE or other rheumatic disease. Some did attribute the symptoms, such as hypomania, to their rheumatic illness, while others, such as a patient with major depression, did not see the two as linked.

A second theme focused on pattern recognition of neuropsychiatric symptoms and the onset of a disease flare. “For example, several patients described how they felt that some types of depressive symptoms were directly attributable to active inflammation due to its time of onset and differences in type and intensity compared to their more ‘reactive’ low mood that could be more attributable to a consequence of psychological distress,” the authors wrote. Another common report from patients was experiencing a sudden, intense fatigue that coincided with a flare and differed from other types of fatigue.

Some patients could recognize that a flare was coming because of familiar neuropsychiatric symptoms that acted like an “early warning system.” Often, however, these symptoms “were absent from current diagnostic guidelines and only rarely identified by clinician interviewees as related to SLE/NPSLE,” the authors found. “These neuropsychiatric prodromal symptoms were reported as sometimes preceding the more widely recognized SLE and other SARD symptoms such as joint pain, rashes, and other organ involvement.” These symptoms included sudden changes in mood (usually a lowering but sometimes mania), increased nightmares, a “feeling of unreality,” or increased sensory symptoms.

Other patients, on the other hand, had not considered a link between neuropsychiatric symptoms and their rheumatic disease until the interview, and many of the clinicians, aside from psychiatrists and nurses, said they had little time in clinic to gather information about symptom progression.
 

Nightmares and Daymares

A third theme centered on disrupted dreaming sleep, nightmares, and “daymares” as a prodromal symptom in particular. Some patients had already drawn a connection between an oncoming flare of their disease and these dreaming-related symptoms, while others had not considered a link until the interviews.

“Several SLE patients recounted flares consistently involving the segueing of increasingly vivid and distressing nightmares into distorted reality and daytime hallucinations,” the authors reported. Flare-related nightmares in particular “often involved being attacked, trapped, crushed, or falling.” Patients tended to be more forthcoming about hallucinatory experiences when the term “daymare” was used to describe them, and they often related to the idea of feeling “in-between asleep and awake.”

Only one of the rheumatologists interviewed had considered nightmares as potentially related to SLE flares, and several appeared skeptical about a link but planned to ask their patients about it. Most of the specialists interviewed, meanwhile, said they often discussed sleep disruption with patients.

“There was agreement that recognizing and eliciting these early flare symptoms may improve care and even reduce clinic times by averting flares at any earlier stage, although some rheumatologists were clear that limited appointment times meant that these symptoms would not be prioritized for discussion,” the authors wrote.

Though Dr. Kim acknowledged the possibility of nightmares as prodromal, he noted other ways in which nightmares may be indirectly linked to lupus. “Trauma is a major risk factor for lupus,” Dr. Kim said, with multiple studies showing childhood traumatic experiences and even posttraumatic stress disorder to be risk factors for lupus. “Whether nightmares represent a traumatic event or prior traumatic events is not clear to me, but one could hypothesize that this may be a manifestation of trauma,” Dr. Kim said.

In addition, nightmares represent a sleep disorder that can substantially reduce sleep quality, Dr. Kim said, and poor sleep is also associated with lupus. “One has to wonder whether disruptive dreaming sleep is one of several specific manifestations of poor sleep quality, which then increases the risk of lupus in those patients,” Dr. Kim said.
 

Misattribution of Neuropsychiatric Symptoms

The final theme to emerge from the findings was patients had been misdiagnosed with psychiatric or psychosomatic conditions shortly before getting their rheumatic disease diagnosis. One patient, for example, reported being diagnosed with borderline personality disorder just 6 months before the lupus diagnosis at age 19 and noticed that the symptoms of one “got under control” when the symptoms of the other did.

“Early misattributions of SARD symptoms to primary psychiatric or psychosomatic conditions were frequently reported to have delayed SARD diagnosis and led to future misattributions,” the authors reported. “Whilst some of these misdiagnoses likely reflect the widespread lack of knowledge and limited definitive tests for SLE, it is plausible that some early SLE neurological and/or psychiatric symptoms may represent a neuropsychiatric prodrome for SLE itself.”

Dr. Kim agreed that misattribution of symptoms to other diagnoses is common with lupus and a common reason for delays in diagnosis, even with symptoms that are not neuropsychiatric. The findings in this study broaden “the type of symptoms we need to put on our radar pre-diagnosis,” Dr. Kim said. “We just also have to be aware that these prodromal symptoms are not diagnostic for lupus, though.”

Dr. Sloan cited earlier work in recommending an “ABC” approach to improving clinician-patient relationships: “Availability is being accessible when patients need them, Belief is demonstrating belief and validating patient self-reports of symptoms, and Continuity is when the same clinician sees the same patient each clinic visit to build up a trusting relationship.” She noted the importance of asking about and normalizing the existence of these symptoms with rheumatic diseases.

The research was funded by The Lupus Trust. Three authors reported consultancy, speaker, or advisory fees from Alumis, Amgen, AstraZeneca, Eli Lilly, GlaxoSmithKline, Janssen, MGP, Novartis, Pfizer, Sanofi, UCB, Vifor, and/or Werfen Group. The other authors, including Dr. Sloan, had no industry-related disclosures. Dr. Kim reported research support from AstraZeneca, GlaxoSmithKline, and Novartis; speaking fees from Exagen Diagnostics and GlaxoSmithKline; and consulting fees from AbbVie, Amgen, ANI Pharmaceuticals, AstraZeneca, Atara Bio, Aurinia Pharmaceuticals, Cargo Therapeutics, Exagen Diagnostics, Hinge Bio, GlaxoSmithKline, Kypha, Miltenyi Biotec, Synthekine, and Tectonic Therapeutic.
 

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

Neuropsychiatric symptoms, including nightmares and hallucinatory “daymares,” may be a more important aspect of systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) than formerly recognized, according to a qualitative mixed methods study published in The Lancet Discovery Science’s eClinicalMedicine. The findings suggested these neuropsychiatric symptoms can sometimes present as prodromal and other times act as an early warning system for a forthcoming flare.

“For clinicians, the key point is to be aware that neurological and psychiatric symptoms are much more common in patients with lupus and other autoimmune systemic rheumatic diseases than previously thought,” lead author Melanie Sloan, PhD, of the Department of Public Health and Primary Care at the University of Cambridge in England, told this news organization.

“If clinicians — and some do already — could all ask about and document these symptoms for each patient, the usual progression of symptoms in a flare can then be monitored, and patients could be supported and treated at an earlier stage,” Dr. Sloan said. “Another key point is to consider systemic autoimmune diseases at an early stage if a patient presents with multiple seemingly unconnected symptoms, which often include both physical and mental health symptoms.”

Alfred Kim, MD, PhD, associate professor of medicine in rheumatology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri, noted the difficulty of determining what neuropsychiatric symptoms may be linked to lupus vs those occurring independently or as part of a different condition.

Dr. Kim

Study Details

In planning for the study, the researchers first searched the existing literature for studies involving neuropsychiatric symptoms in patients with systemic autoimmune rheumatic diseases (SARDs). “The literature indicated frequent underreporting and misattributions of neuropsychiatric symptoms in SLE and other SARD patients, and clinician-patient discordance in neuropsychiatric symptom attribution,” the authors reported.

During 2022-2023, the researchers conducted two surveys, one with 676 adult patients with SLE and one with 400 clinicians, recruited through social media, online patient support groups, and professional networks. All patients self-reported an SLE diagnosis that the researchers did not independently confirm. The patients were predominantly White (80%) and female (94%), ranging in age from 18 to over 70, with most falling between ages 40 and 69. Most patients lived in the United Kingdom (76%) or Europe (15%).

The clinicians included 51% rheumatologists, 24% psychiatrists, 13% neurologists, 5% rheumatology nurses, 3% primary care physicians, and 7% other clinicians. Nearly half of the clinicians (45%) were from the United Kingdom, with others from the United States or Canada (16%), Europe (17%), Asia (9%), Latin America (8%), Australia or New Zealand (3%), or elsewhere (3%).

The patient surveys asked whether they had experienced any of the 29 neuropsychiatric symptoms. For the symptoms that patients had experienced at least three times in their lives, the survey asked when they first experienced the symptom in relation to their SLE onset or other SLE symptoms: Over a year before, within a year of (on either side), 1-4 years after, or more than 5 years after onset/other symptoms. “Other quantitative data included timings of disrupted dreaming sleep in relation to hallucinations for those patients reporting experiencing these,” the authors wrote.

The researchers also conducted video conference interviews with 50 clinicians, including 20 rheumatologists, and 69 interviews with patients who had a systemic autoimmune rheumatic disease, including 27 patients with SLE. Other conditions among those interviewed included inflammatory arthritis, vasculitis, Sjögren disease, systemic sclerosis, myositis, undifferentiated and mixed connective tissue diseases, and polymyalgia rheumatica. During interviews, the term “daymare” was used to discuss possible hallucinations.
 

Linking Neuropsychiatric Symptoms and Disease

Four themes emerged from the analysis of the surveys and interviews. First, despite many rheumatologists stating that it was an “established theory” that most neuropsychiatric symptoms related to SLE would initially present around the time of diagnosis or disease onset, the findings from patients and interviews with psychiatrists did not align with this theory. The first presentation of each neuropsychiatric symptom only occurred around the onset of other SLE symptoms, about one fifth to one third of the time. In fact, more than half of the patients with SLE who had experienced hallucinations or delusions/paranoia said they occurred more than a year after they first experienced their other SLE symptoms.

Patient experiences differed in terms of whether they believed their neuropsychiatric symptoms were directly related to their SLE or other rheumatic disease. Some did attribute the symptoms, such as hypomania, to their rheumatic illness, while others, such as a patient with major depression, did not see the two as linked.

A second theme focused on pattern recognition of neuropsychiatric symptoms and the onset of a disease flare. “For example, several patients described how they felt that some types of depressive symptoms were directly attributable to active inflammation due to its time of onset and differences in type and intensity compared to their more ‘reactive’ low mood that could be more attributable to a consequence of psychological distress,” the authors wrote. Another common report from patients was experiencing a sudden, intense fatigue that coincided with a flare and differed from other types of fatigue.

Some patients could recognize that a flare was coming because of familiar neuropsychiatric symptoms that acted like an “early warning system.” Often, however, these symptoms “were absent from current diagnostic guidelines and only rarely identified by clinician interviewees as related to SLE/NPSLE,” the authors found. “These neuropsychiatric prodromal symptoms were reported as sometimes preceding the more widely recognized SLE and other SARD symptoms such as joint pain, rashes, and other organ involvement.” These symptoms included sudden changes in mood (usually a lowering but sometimes mania), increased nightmares, a “feeling of unreality,” or increased sensory symptoms.

Other patients, on the other hand, had not considered a link between neuropsychiatric symptoms and their rheumatic disease until the interview, and many of the clinicians, aside from psychiatrists and nurses, said they had little time in clinic to gather information about symptom progression.
 

Nightmares and Daymares

A third theme centered on disrupted dreaming sleep, nightmares, and “daymares” as a prodromal symptom in particular. Some patients had already drawn a connection between an oncoming flare of their disease and these dreaming-related symptoms, while others had not considered a link until the interviews.

“Several SLE patients recounted flares consistently involving the segueing of increasingly vivid and distressing nightmares into distorted reality and daytime hallucinations,” the authors reported. Flare-related nightmares in particular “often involved being attacked, trapped, crushed, or falling.” Patients tended to be more forthcoming about hallucinatory experiences when the term “daymare” was used to describe them, and they often related to the idea of feeling “in-between asleep and awake.”

Only one of the rheumatologists interviewed had considered nightmares as potentially related to SLE flares, and several appeared skeptical about a link but planned to ask their patients about it. Most of the specialists interviewed, meanwhile, said they often discussed sleep disruption with patients.

“There was agreement that recognizing and eliciting these early flare symptoms may improve care and even reduce clinic times by averting flares at any earlier stage, although some rheumatologists were clear that limited appointment times meant that these symptoms would not be prioritized for discussion,” the authors wrote.

Though Dr. Kim acknowledged the possibility of nightmares as prodromal, he noted other ways in which nightmares may be indirectly linked to lupus. “Trauma is a major risk factor for lupus,” Dr. Kim said, with multiple studies showing childhood traumatic experiences and even posttraumatic stress disorder to be risk factors for lupus. “Whether nightmares represent a traumatic event or prior traumatic events is not clear to me, but one could hypothesize that this may be a manifestation of trauma,” Dr. Kim said.

In addition, nightmares represent a sleep disorder that can substantially reduce sleep quality, Dr. Kim said, and poor sleep is also associated with lupus. “One has to wonder whether disruptive dreaming sleep is one of several specific manifestations of poor sleep quality, which then increases the risk of lupus in those patients,” Dr. Kim said.
 

Misattribution of Neuropsychiatric Symptoms

The final theme to emerge from the findings was patients had been misdiagnosed with psychiatric or psychosomatic conditions shortly before getting their rheumatic disease diagnosis. One patient, for example, reported being diagnosed with borderline personality disorder just 6 months before the lupus diagnosis at age 19 and noticed that the symptoms of one “got under control” when the symptoms of the other did.

“Early misattributions of SARD symptoms to primary psychiatric or psychosomatic conditions were frequently reported to have delayed SARD diagnosis and led to future misattributions,” the authors reported. “Whilst some of these misdiagnoses likely reflect the widespread lack of knowledge and limited definitive tests for SLE, it is plausible that some early SLE neurological and/or psychiatric symptoms may represent a neuropsychiatric prodrome for SLE itself.”

Dr. Kim agreed that misattribution of symptoms to other diagnoses is common with lupus and a common reason for delays in diagnosis, even with symptoms that are not neuropsychiatric. The findings in this study broaden “the type of symptoms we need to put on our radar pre-diagnosis,” Dr. Kim said. “We just also have to be aware that these prodromal symptoms are not diagnostic for lupus, though.”

Dr. Sloan cited earlier work in recommending an “ABC” approach to improving clinician-patient relationships: “Availability is being accessible when patients need them, Belief is demonstrating belief and validating patient self-reports of symptoms, and Continuity is when the same clinician sees the same patient each clinic visit to build up a trusting relationship.” She noted the importance of asking about and normalizing the existence of these symptoms with rheumatic diseases.

The research was funded by The Lupus Trust. Three authors reported consultancy, speaker, or advisory fees from Alumis, Amgen, AstraZeneca, Eli Lilly, GlaxoSmithKline, Janssen, MGP, Novartis, Pfizer, Sanofi, UCB, Vifor, and/or Werfen Group. The other authors, including Dr. Sloan, had no industry-related disclosures. Dr. Kim reported research support from AstraZeneca, GlaxoSmithKline, and Novartis; speaking fees from Exagen Diagnostics and GlaxoSmithKline; and consulting fees from AbbVie, Amgen, ANI Pharmaceuticals, AstraZeneca, Atara Bio, Aurinia Pharmaceuticals, Cargo Therapeutics, Exagen Diagnostics, Hinge Bio, GlaxoSmithKline, Kypha, Miltenyi Biotec, Synthekine, and Tectonic Therapeutic.
 

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

Neuropsychiatric symptoms, including nightmares and hallucinatory “daymares,” may be a more important aspect of systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) than formerly recognized, according to a qualitative mixed methods study published in The Lancet Discovery Science’s eClinicalMedicine. The findings suggested these neuropsychiatric symptoms can sometimes present as prodromal and other times act as an early warning system for a forthcoming flare.

“For clinicians, the key point is to be aware that neurological and psychiatric symptoms are much more common in patients with lupus and other autoimmune systemic rheumatic diseases than previously thought,” lead author Melanie Sloan, PhD, of the Department of Public Health and Primary Care at the University of Cambridge in England, told this news organization.

“If clinicians — and some do already — could all ask about and document these symptoms for each patient, the usual progression of symptoms in a flare can then be monitored, and patients could be supported and treated at an earlier stage,” Dr. Sloan said. “Another key point is to consider systemic autoimmune diseases at an early stage if a patient presents with multiple seemingly unconnected symptoms, which often include both physical and mental health symptoms.”

Alfred Kim, MD, PhD, associate professor of medicine in rheumatology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri, noted the difficulty of determining what neuropsychiatric symptoms may be linked to lupus vs those occurring independently or as part of a different condition.

Dr. Kim

Study Details

In planning for the study, the researchers first searched the existing literature for studies involving neuropsychiatric symptoms in patients with systemic autoimmune rheumatic diseases (SARDs). “The literature indicated frequent underreporting and misattributions of neuropsychiatric symptoms in SLE and other SARD patients, and clinician-patient discordance in neuropsychiatric symptom attribution,” the authors reported.

During 2022-2023, the researchers conducted two surveys, one with 676 adult patients with SLE and one with 400 clinicians, recruited through social media, online patient support groups, and professional networks. All patients self-reported an SLE diagnosis that the researchers did not independently confirm. The patients were predominantly White (80%) and female (94%), ranging in age from 18 to over 70, with most falling between ages 40 and 69. Most patients lived in the United Kingdom (76%) or Europe (15%).

The clinicians included 51% rheumatologists, 24% psychiatrists, 13% neurologists, 5% rheumatology nurses, 3% primary care physicians, and 7% other clinicians. Nearly half of the clinicians (45%) were from the United Kingdom, with others from the United States or Canada (16%), Europe (17%), Asia (9%), Latin America (8%), Australia or New Zealand (3%), or elsewhere (3%).

The patient surveys asked whether they had experienced any of the 29 neuropsychiatric symptoms. For the symptoms that patients had experienced at least three times in their lives, the survey asked when they first experienced the symptom in relation to their SLE onset or other SLE symptoms: Over a year before, within a year of (on either side), 1-4 years after, or more than 5 years after onset/other symptoms. “Other quantitative data included timings of disrupted dreaming sleep in relation to hallucinations for those patients reporting experiencing these,” the authors wrote.

The researchers also conducted video conference interviews with 50 clinicians, including 20 rheumatologists, and 69 interviews with patients who had a systemic autoimmune rheumatic disease, including 27 patients with SLE. Other conditions among those interviewed included inflammatory arthritis, vasculitis, Sjögren disease, systemic sclerosis, myositis, undifferentiated and mixed connective tissue diseases, and polymyalgia rheumatica. During interviews, the term “daymare” was used to discuss possible hallucinations.
 

Linking Neuropsychiatric Symptoms and Disease

Four themes emerged from the analysis of the surveys and interviews. First, despite many rheumatologists stating that it was an “established theory” that most neuropsychiatric symptoms related to SLE would initially present around the time of diagnosis or disease onset, the findings from patients and interviews with psychiatrists did not align with this theory. The first presentation of each neuropsychiatric symptom only occurred around the onset of other SLE symptoms, about one fifth to one third of the time. In fact, more than half of the patients with SLE who had experienced hallucinations or delusions/paranoia said they occurred more than a year after they first experienced their other SLE symptoms.

Patient experiences differed in terms of whether they believed their neuropsychiatric symptoms were directly related to their SLE or other rheumatic disease. Some did attribute the symptoms, such as hypomania, to their rheumatic illness, while others, such as a patient with major depression, did not see the two as linked.

A second theme focused on pattern recognition of neuropsychiatric symptoms and the onset of a disease flare. “For example, several patients described how they felt that some types of depressive symptoms were directly attributable to active inflammation due to its time of onset and differences in type and intensity compared to their more ‘reactive’ low mood that could be more attributable to a consequence of psychological distress,” the authors wrote. Another common report from patients was experiencing a sudden, intense fatigue that coincided with a flare and differed from other types of fatigue.

Some patients could recognize that a flare was coming because of familiar neuropsychiatric symptoms that acted like an “early warning system.” Often, however, these symptoms “were absent from current diagnostic guidelines and only rarely identified by clinician interviewees as related to SLE/NPSLE,” the authors found. “These neuropsychiatric prodromal symptoms were reported as sometimes preceding the more widely recognized SLE and other SARD symptoms such as joint pain, rashes, and other organ involvement.” These symptoms included sudden changes in mood (usually a lowering but sometimes mania), increased nightmares, a “feeling of unreality,” or increased sensory symptoms.

Other patients, on the other hand, had not considered a link between neuropsychiatric symptoms and their rheumatic disease until the interview, and many of the clinicians, aside from psychiatrists and nurses, said they had little time in clinic to gather information about symptom progression.
 

Nightmares and Daymares

A third theme centered on disrupted dreaming sleep, nightmares, and “daymares” as a prodromal symptom in particular. Some patients had already drawn a connection between an oncoming flare of their disease and these dreaming-related symptoms, while others had not considered a link until the interviews.

“Several SLE patients recounted flares consistently involving the segueing of increasingly vivid and distressing nightmares into distorted reality and daytime hallucinations,” the authors reported. Flare-related nightmares in particular “often involved being attacked, trapped, crushed, or falling.” Patients tended to be more forthcoming about hallucinatory experiences when the term “daymare” was used to describe them, and they often related to the idea of feeling “in-between asleep and awake.”

Only one of the rheumatologists interviewed had considered nightmares as potentially related to SLE flares, and several appeared skeptical about a link but planned to ask their patients about it. Most of the specialists interviewed, meanwhile, said they often discussed sleep disruption with patients.

“There was agreement that recognizing and eliciting these early flare symptoms may improve care and even reduce clinic times by averting flares at any earlier stage, although some rheumatologists were clear that limited appointment times meant that these symptoms would not be prioritized for discussion,” the authors wrote.

Though Dr. Kim acknowledged the possibility of nightmares as prodromal, he noted other ways in which nightmares may be indirectly linked to lupus. “Trauma is a major risk factor for lupus,” Dr. Kim said, with multiple studies showing childhood traumatic experiences and even posttraumatic stress disorder to be risk factors for lupus. “Whether nightmares represent a traumatic event or prior traumatic events is not clear to me, but one could hypothesize that this may be a manifestation of trauma,” Dr. Kim said.

In addition, nightmares represent a sleep disorder that can substantially reduce sleep quality, Dr. Kim said, and poor sleep is also associated with lupus. “One has to wonder whether disruptive dreaming sleep is one of several specific manifestations of poor sleep quality, which then increases the risk of lupus in those patients,” Dr. Kim said.
 

Misattribution of Neuropsychiatric Symptoms

The final theme to emerge from the findings was patients had been misdiagnosed with psychiatric or psychosomatic conditions shortly before getting their rheumatic disease diagnosis. One patient, for example, reported being diagnosed with borderline personality disorder just 6 months before the lupus diagnosis at age 19 and noticed that the symptoms of one “got under control” when the symptoms of the other did.

“Early misattributions of SARD symptoms to primary psychiatric or psychosomatic conditions were frequently reported to have delayed SARD diagnosis and led to future misattributions,” the authors reported. “Whilst some of these misdiagnoses likely reflect the widespread lack of knowledge and limited definitive tests for SLE, it is plausible that some early SLE neurological and/or psychiatric symptoms may represent a neuropsychiatric prodrome for SLE itself.”

Dr. Kim agreed that misattribution of symptoms to other diagnoses is common with lupus and a common reason for delays in diagnosis, even with symptoms that are not neuropsychiatric. The findings in this study broaden “the type of symptoms we need to put on our radar pre-diagnosis,” Dr. Kim said. “We just also have to be aware that these prodromal symptoms are not diagnostic for lupus, though.”

Dr. Sloan cited earlier work in recommending an “ABC” approach to improving clinician-patient relationships: “Availability is being accessible when patients need them, Belief is demonstrating belief and validating patient self-reports of symptoms, and Continuity is when the same clinician sees the same patient each clinic visit to build up a trusting relationship.” She noted the importance of asking about and normalizing the existence of these symptoms with rheumatic diseases.

The research was funded by The Lupus Trust. Three authors reported consultancy, speaker, or advisory fees from Alumis, Amgen, AstraZeneca, Eli Lilly, GlaxoSmithKline, Janssen, MGP, Novartis, Pfizer, Sanofi, UCB, Vifor, and/or Werfen Group. The other authors, including Dr. Sloan, had no industry-related disclosures. Dr. Kim reported research support from AstraZeneca, GlaxoSmithKline, and Novartis; speaking fees from Exagen Diagnostics and GlaxoSmithKline; and consulting fees from AbbVie, Amgen, ANI Pharmaceuticals, AstraZeneca, Atara Bio, Aurinia Pharmaceuticals, Cargo Therapeutics, Exagen Diagnostics, Hinge Bio, GlaxoSmithKline, Kypha, Miltenyi Biotec, Synthekine, and Tectonic Therapeutic.
 

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

BASEL, SWITZERLAND — New findings challenge the practice of rapidly lowering blood pressure (BP) in acute ischemic stroke to allow for speedy thrombolysis.

The observational cluster study showed that patients treated in hospitals that followed the guideline-recommended practice of rapidly reducing BP did no better — and actually showed a trend toward worse outcomes — than those treated in hospitals that did not lower BP, even though this meant fewer patient received thrombolysis. 

“We found insufficient evidence to recommend active blood pressure lowering in patients with ischemic stroke who have blood pressure levels exceeding the guidelines but are otherwise eligible for thrombolytic therapy,” said senior study author Nyika D. Kruyt, MD, PhD, Leiden University Medical Center, the Netherlands. 

“Our results suggest that if the blood pressure is too high for thrombolysis, then it is best to wait and only treat with thrombolysis if the blood pressure drops spontaneously,” Dr. Kruyt said.

The findings were presented at the European Stroke Organisation Conference (ESOC) annual meeting and published online in The Lancet Neurology. 
 

Guidelines Without Evidence?

Owing to concerns about high BP increasing the risk for intracerebral hemorrhage after thrombolysis, the original trials evaluating thrombolysis in stroke set an arbitrary threshold of 185/110 mm Hg, which has been incorporated into stroke guidelines. These trials cautioned against lowering BP rapidly, which is not included in guidelines. 

Most stroke centers therefore tend to rapidly lower BP in patients who have values greater than 185/110 mm Hg and who are otherwise eligible for thrombolysis, investigators noted. Because thrombolysis is more effective the earlier it is administered, there is some urgency to reduce the BP quickly when patients first arrive at the hospital. 

“But there has never been any evidence for the lowering of blood pressure with IV [intravenous] antihypertensives before thrombolysis, and some centers have never adopted this approach because of concerns that a rapid decline in blood pressure may reduce perfusion of the brain at a time when there is already ischemia present,” Dr. Kruyt noted. 

However, if BP is lowered quickly, there is a greater chance that patients will not be able to receive thrombolysis because the 4.5-hour time limit could be exceeded.

For the prospective, observational TRUTH study, researchers compared outcomes in 853 patients treated at 27 stroke centers in the Netherlands with an active BP-lowering strategy vs 199 patients treated at 10 hospitals with no such strategy. 

Baseline characteristics of participants in the two groups were similar. 

Results showed a strong trend toward worse outcomes in participants whose BP was lowered, with an adjusted odds ratio (aOR) for a shift toward a worse 90-day functional outcome on the modified Rankin Scale of 1.27 (95% CI, 0.96-1.68). 

This was despite the fact that many more patients whose BP was reduced received thrombolysis (94% vs 52% of those with no BP lowering) and had shorter times to treatment, with average door-to-needle times of 35 minutes (vs 47 minutes among those with no BP lowering). 

Symptomatic intracranial hemorrhage occurred in 5% of the active BP-lowering group versus 3% of those who did not have their BP lowered (aOR, 1.28; 95% CI, 0.62-2.62).
 

Reconsider Guidelines?

These results are consistent with those from the INTERACT4 trial, which was also presented at the ESOC 2024 meeting. That trial showed a harmful effect of lowering BP in the ambulance in patients with acute ischemic stroke, but a beneficial effect in patients with hemorrhagic stroke.

“I think the guidelines need to be reconsidered after these studies and we should refrain from active blood pressure–lowering in patients with acute ischemic stroke,” Dr. Kruyt said. 

But he acknowledged that not rapidly lowering BP will mean fewer patients will be able to receive thrombolysis within the 4.5-hour treatment window.

Dr. Kruyt estimated that the combination of being eligible for thrombolysis, with the only exclusion criterion being BP greater than 185/110 mm Hg, applies to about 10%-15% of patients. 

“If we have a watch-and-wait policy, then about half of those patients will still get treated with thrombolysis within in the 4.5-hour limit but later than if blood pressure was reduced with IV antihypertensives,” he added. 

Dr. Kruyt noted that there has never been a randomized trial on the practice of BP lowering in order to be able to administer thrombolysis. 

“The 185/110 mm Hg blood pressure level is an arbitrary threshold that was chosen for the original thrombolysis stroke trials,” he said. “I believe we need trials to investigate whether we can give thrombolysis safely to patients with higher blood pressure levels than this, without needing to rapidly reduce the pressure.”
 

Caution Advised

Discussing the TRUTH study at the ESOC meeting, Guillaume Turc, MD, professor of neurology at Sainte-Anne Hospital, Paris, said he thought the findings were “very thought provoking.”

Simona Sacco, MD, professor of neurology at the University of L’Aquila, Italy, said the result was surprising, but she advised caution in acting on this finding. 

“I don’t think this study can change practice or guidelines as it is not a randomized trial. Yes, it can generate a hypothesis, but we need more research before changing clinical practice,” she said. 

In an accompanying editorial, Verónica Olavarría, MD, Clínica Alemana Universidad del Desarrollo, Santiago, Chile, also suggested the trial should be interpreted cautiously because there was “insufficient evidence for a definitive conclusion.”

But Dr. Kruyt noted that even though the TRUTH study was not a randomized trial, the results are in line with those of recent randomized trials such as INTERACT4.

He added that the ENCHANTED trial also showed no benefit of intensive BP management immediately after thrombolysis in mild to moderate stroke and even suggested harm in severe stroke. And other trials (OPTIMAL-BP and ENCHANTED2/MT) have shown worse outcomes with BP lowering in patients with acute ischemic stroke undergoing thrombectomy. 

“All these studies are showing similar signals throughout the whole timeline in acute ischemic stroke. The results are very much in line with each other. I think this strengthens our findings,” Dr. Kruyt said. 

“With this data, I think the guidelines should be revised, and until randomized data become available showing that reducing blood pressure in acute ischemic stroke patients in order for them to receive early thrombolysis is beneficial, then we should refrain from doing so,” he added.

INTERACT4 investigator Craig Anderson, MD, George Institute for Global Health, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, agreed. 

“The TRUTH study gives the same message as INTERACT4. They are completely in line with each other, both suggesting harm with blood pressure lowering in acute ischemic stroke. These two together are going to rattle the cage around blood pressure control in acute ischemic stroke patients,” Dr. Anderson said. 

The TRUTH study was funded by a grant from Fonds NutsOhra. Dr. Kruyt reported no relevant financial disclosures. Dr. Olavarría reported receiving a grant from Boehringer Ingelheim for the RECCA registry and honoraria from Novo Nordisk.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

BASEL, SWITZERLAND — New findings challenge the practice of rapidly lowering blood pressure (BP) in acute ischemic stroke to allow for speedy thrombolysis.

The observational cluster study showed that patients treated in hospitals that followed the guideline-recommended practice of rapidly reducing BP did no better — and actually showed a trend toward worse outcomes — than those treated in hospitals that did not lower BP, even though this meant fewer patient received thrombolysis. 

“We found insufficient evidence to recommend active blood pressure lowering in patients with ischemic stroke who have blood pressure levels exceeding the guidelines but are otherwise eligible for thrombolytic therapy,” said senior study author Nyika D. Kruyt, MD, PhD, Leiden University Medical Center, the Netherlands. 

“Our results suggest that if the blood pressure is too high for thrombolysis, then it is best to wait and only treat with thrombolysis if the blood pressure drops spontaneously,” Dr. Kruyt said.

The findings were presented at the European Stroke Organisation Conference (ESOC) annual meeting and published online in The Lancet Neurology. 
 

Guidelines Without Evidence?

Owing to concerns about high BP increasing the risk for intracerebral hemorrhage after thrombolysis, the original trials evaluating thrombolysis in stroke set an arbitrary threshold of 185/110 mm Hg, which has been incorporated into stroke guidelines. These trials cautioned against lowering BP rapidly, which is not included in guidelines. 

Most stroke centers therefore tend to rapidly lower BP in patients who have values greater than 185/110 mm Hg and who are otherwise eligible for thrombolysis, investigators noted. Because thrombolysis is more effective the earlier it is administered, there is some urgency to reduce the BP quickly when patients first arrive at the hospital. 

“But there has never been any evidence for the lowering of blood pressure with IV [intravenous] antihypertensives before thrombolysis, and some centers have never adopted this approach because of concerns that a rapid decline in blood pressure may reduce perfusion of the brain at a time when there is already ischemia present,” Dr. Kruyt noted. 

However, if BP is lowered quickly, there is a greater chance that patients will not be able to receive thrombolysis because the 4.5-hour time limit could be exceeded.

For the prospective, observational TRUTH study, researchers compared outcomes in 853 patients treated at 27 stroke centers in the Netherlands with an active BP-lowering strategy vs 199 patients treated at 10 hospitals with no such strategy. 

Baseline characteristics of participants in the two groups were similar. 

Results showed a strong trend toward worse outcomes in participants whose BP was lowered, with an adjusted odds ratio (aOR) for a shift toward a worse 90-day functional outcome on the modified Rankin Scale of 1.27 (95% CI, 0.96-1.68). 

This was despite the fact that many more patients whose BP was reduced received thrombolysis (94% vs 52% of those with no BP lowering) and had shorter times to treatment, with average door-to-needle times of 35 minutes (vs 47 minutes among those with no BP lowering). 

Symptomatic intracranial hemorrhage occurred in 5% of the active BP-lowering group versus 3% of those who did not have their BP lowered (aOR, 1.28; 95% CI, 0.62-2.62).
 

Reconsider Guidelines?

These results are consistent with those from the INTERACT4 trial, which was also presented at the ESOC 2024 meeting. That trial showed a harmful effect of lowering BP in the ambulance in patients with acute ischemic stroke, but a beneficial effect in patients with hemorrhagic stroke.

“I think the guidelines need to be reconsidered after these studies and we should refrain from active blood pressure–lowering in patients with acute ischemic stroke,” Dr. Kruyt said. 

But he acknowledged that not rapidly lowering BP will mean fewer patients will be able to receive thrombolysis within the 4.5-hour treatment window.

Dr. Kruyt estimated that the combination of being eligible for thrombolysis, with the only exclusion criterion being BP greater than 185/110 mm Hg, applies to about 10%-15% of patients. 

“If we have a watch-and-wait policy, then about half of those patients will still get treated with thrombolysis within in the 4.5-hour limit but later than if blood pressure was reduced with IV antihypertensives,” he added. 

Dr. Kruyt noted that there has never been a randomized trial on the practice of BP lowering in order to be able to administer thrombolysis. 

“The 185/110 mm Hg blood pressure level is an arbitrary threshold that was chosen for the original thrombolysis stroke trials,” he said. “I believe we need trials to investigate whether we can give thrombolysis safely to patients with higher blood pressure levels than this, without needing to rapidly reduce the pressure.”
 

Caution Advised

Discussing the TRUTH study at the ESOC meeting, Guillaume Turc, MD, professor of neurology at Sainte-Anne Hospital, Paris, said he thought the findings were “very thought provoking.”

Simona Sacco, MD, professor of neurology at the University of L’Aquila, Italy, said the result was surprising, but she advised caution in acting on this finding. 

“I don’t think this study can change practice or guidelines as it is not a randomized trial. Yes, it can generate a hypothesis, but we need more research before changing clinical practice,” she said. 

In an accompanying editorial, Verónica Olavarría, MD, Clínica Alemana Universidad del Desarrollo, Santiago, Chile, also suggested the trial should be interpreted cautiously because there was “insufficient evidence for a definitive conclusion.”

But Dr. Kruyt noted that even though the TRUTH study was not a randomized trial, the results are in line with those of recent randomized trials such as INTERACT4.

He added that the ENCHANTED trial also showed no benefit of intensive BP management immediately after thrombolysis in mild to moderate stroke and even suggested harm in severe stroke. And other trials (OPTIMAL-BP and ENCHANTED2/MT) have shown worse outcomes with BP lowering in patients with acute ischemic stroke undergoing thrombectomy. 

“All these studies are showing similar signals throughout the whole timeline in acute ischemic stroke. The results are very much in line with each other. I think this strengthens our findings,” Dr. Kruyt said. 

“With this data, I think the guidelines should be revised, and until randomized data become available showing that reducing blood pressure in acute ischemic stroke patients in order for them to receive early thrombolysis is beneficial, then we should refrain from doing so,” he added.

INTERACT4 investigator Craig Anderson, MD, George Institute for Global Health, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, agreed. 

“The TRUTH study gives the same message as INTERACT4. They are completely in line with each other, both suggesting harm with blood pressure lowering in acute ischemic stroke. These two together are going to rattle the cage around blood pressure control in acute ischemic stroke patients,” Dr. Anderson said. 

The TRUTH study was funded by a grant from Fonds NutsOhra. Dr. Kruyt reported no relevant financial disclosures. Dr. Olavarría reported receiving a grant from Boehringer Ingelheim for the RECCA registry and honoraria from Novo Nordisk.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

BASEL, SWITZERLAND — New findings challenge the practice of rapidly lowering blood pressure (BP) in acute ischemic stroke to allow for speedy thrombolysis.

The observational cluster study showed that patients treated in hospitals that followed the guideline-recommended practice of rapidly reducing BP did no better — and actually showed a trend toward worse outcomes — than those treated in hospitals that did not lower BP, even though this meant fewer patient received thrombolysis. 

“We found insufficient evidence to recommend active blood pressure lowering in patients with ischemic stroke who have blood pressure levels exceeding the guidelines but are otherwise eligible for thrombolytic therapy,” said senior study author Nyika D. Kruyt, MD, PhD, Leiden University Medical Center, the Netherlands. 

“Our results suggest that if the blood pressure is too high for thrombolysis, then it is best to wait and only treat with thrombolysis if the blood pressure drops spontaneously,” Dr. Kruyt said.

The findings were presented at the European Stroke Organisation Conference (ESOC) annual meeting and published online in The Lancet Neurology. 
 

Guidelines Without Evidence?

Owing to concerns about high BP increasing the risk for intracerebral hemorrhage after thrombolysis, the original trials evaluating thrombolysis in stroke set an arbitrary threshold of 185/110 mm Hg, which has been incorporated into stroke guidelines. These trials cautioned against lowering BP rapidly, which is not included in guidelines. 

Most stroke centers therefore tend to rapidly lower BP in patients who have values greater than 185/110 mm Hg and who are otherwise eligible for thrombolysis, investigators noted. Because thrombolysis is more effective the earlier it is administered, there is some urgency to reduce the BP quickly when patients first arrive at the hospital. 

“But there has never been any evidence for the lowering of blood pressure with IV [intravenous] antihypertensives before thrombolysis, and some centers have never adopted this approach because of concerns that a rapid decline in blood pressure may reduce perfusion of the brain at a time when there is already ischemia present,” Dr. Kruyt noted. 

However, if BP is lowered quickly, there is a greater chance that patients will not be able to receive thrombolysis because the 4.5-hour time limit could be exceeded.

For the prospective, observational TRUTH study, researchers compared outcomes in 853 patients treated at 27 stroke centers in the Netherlands with an active BP-lowering strategy vs 199 patients treated at 10 hospitals with no such strategy. 

Baseline characteristics of participants in the two groups were similar. 

Results showed a strong trend toward worse outcomes in participants whose BP was lowered, with an adjusted odds ratio (aOR) for a shift toward a worse 90-day functional outcome on the modified Rankin Scale of 1.27 (95% CI, 0.96-1.68). 

This was despite the fact that many more patients whose BP was reduced received thrombolysis (94% vs 52% of those with no BP lowering) and had shorter times to treatment, with average door-to-needle times of 35 minutes (vs 47 minutes among those with no BP lowering). 

Symptomatic intracranial hemorrhage occurred in 5% of the active BP-lowering group versus 3% of those who did not have their BP lowered (aOR, 1.28; 95% CI, 0.62-2.62).
 

Reconsider Guidelines?

These results are consistent with those from the INTERACT4 trial, which was also presented at the ESOC 2024 meeting. That trial showed a harmful effect of lowering BP in the ambulance in patients with acute ischemic stroke, but a beneficial effect in patients with hemorrhagic stroke.

“I think the guidelines need to be reconsidered after these studies and we should refrain from active blood pressure–lowering in patients with acute ischemic stroke,” Dr. Kruyt said. 

But he acknowledged that not rapidly lowering BP will mean fewer patients will be able to receive thrombolysis within the 4.5-hour treatment window.

Dr. Kruyt estimated that the combination of being eligible for thrombolysis, with the only exclusion criterion being BP greater than 185/110 mm Hg, applies to about 10%-15% of patients. 

“If we have a watch-and-wait policy, then about half of those patients will still get treated with thrombolysis within in the 4.5-hour limit but later than if blood pressure was reduced with IV antihypertensives,” he added. 

Dr. Kruyt noted that there has never been a randomized trial on the practice of BP lowering in order to be able to administer thrombolysis. 

“The 185/110 mm Hg blood pressure level is an arbitrary threshold that was chosen for the original thrombolysis stroke trials,” he said. “I believe we need trials to investigate whether we can give thrombolysis safely to patients with higher blood pressure levels than this, without needing to rapidly reduce the pressure.”
 

Caution Advised

Discussing the TRUTH study at the ESOC meeting, Guillaume Turc, MD, professor of neurology at Sainte-Anne Hospital, Paris, said he thought the findings were “very thought provoking.”

Simona Sacco, MD, professor of neurology at the University of L’Aquila, Italy, said the result was surprising, but she advised caution in acting on this finding. 

“I don’t think this study can change practice or guidelines as it is not a randomized trial. Yes, it can generate a hypothesis, but we need more research before changing clinical practice,” she said. 

In an accompanying editorial, Verónica Olavarría, MD, Clínica Alemana Universidad del Desarrollo, Santiago, Chile, also suggested the trial should be interpreted cautiously because there was “insufficient evidence for a definitive conclusion.”

But Dr. Kruyt noted that even though the TRUTH study was not a randomized trial, the results are in line with those of recent randomized trials such as INTERACT4.

He added that the ENCHANTED trial also showed no benefit of intensive BP management immediately after thrombolysis in mild to moderate stroke and even suggested harm in severe stroke. And other trials (OPTIMAL-BP and ENCHANTED2/MT) have shown worse outcomes with BP lowering in patients with acute ischemic stroke undergoing thrombectomy. 

“All these studies are showing similar signals throughout the whole timeline in acute ischemic stroke. The results are very much in line with each other. I think this strengthens our findings,” Dr. Kruyt said. 

“With this data, I think the guidelines should be revised, and until randomized data become available showing that reducing blood pressure in acute ischemic stroke patients in order for them to receive early thrombolysis is beneficial, then we should refrain from doing so,” he added.

INTERACT4 investigator Craig Anderson, MD, George Institute for Global Health, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, agreed. 

“The TRUTH study gives the same message as INTERACT4. They are completely in line with each other, both suggesting harm with blood pressure lowering in acute ischemic stroke. These two together are going to rattle the cage around blood pressure control in acute ischemic stroke patients,” Dr. Anderson said. 

The TRUTH study was funded by a grant from Fonds NutsOhra. Dr. Kruyt reported no relevant financial disclosures. Dr. Olavarría reported receiving a grant from Boehringer Ingelheim for the RECCA registry and honoraria from Novo Nordisk.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

BASEL, SWITZERLAND — Minor ischemic stroke patients with intracranial occlusion should not be treated with IV thrombolysis, a new trial has concluded.

Results from the randomized controlled trial TEMPO-2 showed no benefit from treatment with tenecteplase following ischemic stroke. In addition, investigators found a small increased risk for symptomatic intracranial hemorrhage (ICH) and more deaths in the tenecteplase group compared with the control group.

The research suggests that although it makes sense to open up vessels in patients with minor stroke, they didn’t do better with thrombolysis.

“This is not the result we were hoping for, but I think the question of whether to treat these minor stroke patients who are not disabled has now been answered,” said lead investigator Shelagh B. Coutts, MD, University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada.

“After these results, I think we should scan these patients, admit them, give them dual antiplatelet therapy and IV fluids, and watch them like a hawk. If they deteriorate, we can intervene at that point.”

The findings were presented at the European Stroke Organization Conference (ESOC) 2024 annual meeting and published online simultaneously in The Lancet.
 

Very Little Data

Up to half of patients with ischemic stroke initially present with minimal symptoms, which are not disabling, investigators noted. Despite having low scores on the National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS) that typically range from 0 to 5, a third of these patients are dead or disabled at 90-day follow-up if thrombolysis is withheld.

Patients with minor deficits and evidence of an intracranial occlusion are a subpopulation at a high risk for early neurological deterioration, which most often occurs within the first 24 hours after presentation.

However, many physicians have concerns about giving thrombolysis to these patients because of the potential harm from bleeding in the absence of major deficits, and most trials of thrombolysis have excluded patients with minor stroke. That leaves very little high-quality data to guide practice for these patients.

Two previous studies have compared alteplase with antiplatelet agents in minor stroke, but no trial has specifically looked at the subset of patients with minor stroke who have intracranial occlusion. The TEMPO-2 trial was conducted to evaluate the use of tenecteplase in this patient population.

The multicenter, parallel group, open-label study was conducted at 48 hospitals in Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, Finland, Ireland, New Zealand, Singapore, Spain, and the United Kingdom.

The trial included patients with minor acute ischemic stroke (NIHSS score of 0-5) and intracranial occlusion or focal perfusion abnormality who were within 12 hours from stroke onset.

Patients received IV tenecteplase (0.25 mg/kg) or non-thrombolytic standard of care (control). Most patients in the control group were treated with dual antiplatelet therapy with aspirin and clopidogrel (57%) or aspirin monotherapy (23%).

The trial was stopped early for futility after 886 patients had been enrolled. The median NIHSS score was 2.

The primary outcome — a return to baseline functioning on the modified Rankin Scale score at 90 days — occurred in 75% of the control group and in 72% of the tenecteplase group (risk ratio [RR], 0.96; P = .29).

Although there were significantly more patients with early recanalization and an NIHSS score of 0 at day 5 or discharge after tenecteplase treatment, this did not translate into improved functional outcomes at 90 days.

More patients died in the tenecteplase group compared with the control group (5% vs 1%; adjusted hazard ratio, 3.8; P = .0085).

There were eight (2%) symptomatic ICHs in the tenecteplase group versus two (< 1%) in the control group (RR, 4.2; P = .059).

The ICH rate was not different in patients treated after 4.5 hours versus before 4.5 hours. The subgroup of patients treated at 4.5-12.0 hours showed weaker evidence of better outcomes with thrombolysis than those treated before 4.5 hours, suggesting that the 12-hour window for TEMPO-2 did not explain the absence of benefit seen with tenecteplase.

Patients in the control group did better than expected, which may have been the result of chance, patient selection, or greater use of dual antiplatelet therapy, researchers noted.

Despite higher recanalization rates in the tenecteplase group (48% vs 22%), there was no change in the rate of stroke progression between groups, with an 8% rate of progression seen overall in the study.

Noting that previous studies have shown that patients with minor stroke and intracranial occlusion are at a risk for both progression and disability, the authors suggested that good supportive care may have improved outcomes in both groups.
 

More Trials Needed

Commenting on the study at the ESOC meeting, Urs Fischer, MD, Basel University Hospital, Switzerland, said “What should we do for patients with mild stroke with vessel occlusion has been a huge unanswered question. The TEMPO-2 study did not show a benefit with thrombolysis, and there was a tendency toward an increased risk of ICH. This is an important finding.”

In an accompanying editorial, Simona Sacco, MD, University of L’Aquila, Italy, and Guillaume Turc, MD, Université Paris Cité, France, noted that different minor ischemic stroke populations pose different therapeutic challenges.

Observational data suggest a benefit of endovascular treatment for minor stroke with large vessel occlusion, and dedicated randomized controlled trials in this group are ongoing, they added.

Early dual antiplatelet treatment is now the recommended treatment of minor stroke and should therefore be the active comparator for non-cardioembolic strokes in future trials.

While TEMPO-2 did not prove that tenecteplase is better than the standard of care for the acute treatment of minor stroke, Dr. Sacco and Dr. Turc said the study confirms that tenecteplase is associated with a high rate of recanalization.

“Fast recanalization with intravenous thrombolysis, endovascular treatment, proper patient selection, and combination with dual antiplatelet treatment or early initiation of anticoagulants may translate into tangible clinical benefits for patients with minor ischemic stroke, which should be tested in future studies,” they wrote.

This trial was funded by grants from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada, and the British Heart Foundation. Boehringer Ingelheim provided tenecteplase for the study. Dr. Coutts reported no conflicts of interest. Dr. Sacco reported receiving grants for research from Novartis and Uriach; consulting fees from Novartis, Allergan-AbbVie, Teva, Lilly, Lundbeck, Pfizer, Novo Nordisk, Abbott, and AstraZeneca; payment for lectures from Novartis, Allergan-AbbVie, Teva, Lilly, Lundbeck, Pfizer, Novo Nordisk, Abbott, and AstraZeneca; and support for attending conferences from Lilly, Novartis, Teva, Lundbeck, and Pfizer. She is president elect of the European Stroke Organization and editor-in-chief of Cephalalgia. Dr. Turc reported payment for lectures from Guerbet France, is a member of the scientific advisory board of AI-Stroke, and is the Secretary General of the European Stroke Organisation.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

BASEL, SWITZERLAND — Minor ischemic stroke patients with intracranial occlusion should not be treated with IV thrombolysis, a new trial has concluded.

Results from the randomized controlled trial TEMPO-2 showed no benefit from treatment with tenecteplase following ischemic stroke. In addition, investigators found a small increased risk for symptomatic intracranial hemorrhage (ICH) and more deaths in the tenecteplase group compared with the control group.

The research suggests that although it makes sense to open up vessels in patients with minor stroke, they didn’t do better with thrombolysis.

“This is not the result we were hoping for, but I think the question of whether to treat these minor stroke patients who are not disabled has now been answered,” said lead investigator Shelagh B. Coutts, MD, University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada.

“After these results, I think we should scan these patients, admit them, give them dual antiplatelet therapy and IV fluids, and watch them like a hawk. If they deteriorate, we can intervene at that point.”

The findings were presented at the European Stroke Organization Conference (ESOC) 2024 annual meeting and published online simultaneously in The Lancet.
 

Very Little Data

Up to half of patients with ischemic stroke initially present with minimal symptoms, which are not disabling, investigators noted. Despite having low scores on the National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS) that typically range from 0 to 5, a third of these patients are dead or disabled at 90-day follow-up if thrombolysis is withheld.

Patients with minor deficits and evidence of an intracranial occlusion are a subpopulation at a high risk for early neurological deterioration, which most often occurs within the first 24 hours after presentation.

However, many physicians have concerns about giving thrombolysis to these patients because of the potential harm from bleeding in the absence of major deficits, and most trials of thrombolysis have excluded patients with minor stroke. That leaves very little high-quality data to guide practice for these patients.

Two previous studies have compared alteplase with antiplatelet agents in minor stroke, but no trial has specifically looked at the subset of patients with minor stroke who have intracranial occlusion. The TEMPO-2 trial was conducted to evaluate the use of tenecteplase in this patient population.

The multicenter, parallel group, open-label study was conducted at 48 hospitals in Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, Finland, Ireland, New Zealand, Singapore, Spain, and the United Kingdom.

The trial included patients with minor acute ischemic stroke (NIHSS score of 0-5) and intracranial occlusion or focal perfusion abnormality who were within 12 hours from stroke onset.

Patients received IV tenecteplase (0.25 mg/kg) or non-thrombolytic standard of care (control). Most patients in the control group were treated with dual antiplatelet therapy with aspirin and clopidogrel (57%) or aspirin monotherapy (23%).

The trial was stopped early for futility after 886 patients had been enrolled. The median NIHSS score was 2.

The primary outcome — a return to baseline functioning on the modified Rankin Scale score at 90 days — occurred in 75% of the control group and in 72% of the tenecteplase group (risk ratio [RR], 0.96; P = .29).

Although there were significantly more patients with early recanalization and an NIHSS score of 0 at day 5 or discharge after tenecteplase treatment, this did not translate into improved functional outcomes at 90 days.

More patients died in the tenecteplase group compared with the control group (5% vs 1%; adjusted hazard ratio, 3.8; P = .0085).

There were eight (2%) symptomatic ICHs in the tenecteplase group versus two (< 1%) in the control group (RR, 4.2; P = .059).

The ICH rate was not different in patients treated after 4.5 hours versus before 4.5 hours. The subgroup of patients treated at 4.5-12.0 hours showed weaker evidence of better outcomes with thrombolysis than those treated before 4.5 hours, suggesting that the 12-hour window for TEMPO-2 did not explain the absence of benefit seen with tenecteplase.

Patients in the control group did better than expected, which may have been the result of chance, patient selection, or greater use of dual antiplatelet therapy, researchers noted.

Despite higher recanalization rates in the tenecteplase group (48% vs 22%), there was no change in the rate of stroke progression between groups, with an 8% rate of progression seen overall in the study.

Noting that previous studies have shown that patients with minor stroke and intracranial occlusion are at a risk for both progression and disability, the authors suggested that good supportive care may have improved outcomes in both groups.
 

More Trials Needed

Commenting on the study at the ESOC meeting, Urs Fischer, MD, Basel University Hospital, Switzerland, said “What should we do for patients with mild stroke with vessel occlusion has been a huge unanswered question. The TEMPO-2 study did not show a benefit with thrombolysis, and there was a tendency toward an increased risk of ICH. This is an important finding.”

In an accompanying editorial, Simona Sacco, MD, University of L’Aquila, Italy, and Guillaume Turc, MD, Université Paris Cité, France, noted that different minor ischemic stroke populations pose different therapeutic challenges.

Observational data suggest a benefit of endovascular treatment for minor stroke with large vessel occlusion, and dedicated randomized controlled trials in this group are ongoing, they added.

Early dual antiplatelet treatment is now the recommended treatment of minor stroke and should therefore be the active comparator for non-cardioembolic strokes in future trials.

While TEMPO-2 did not prove that tenecteplase is better than the standard of care for the acute treatment of minor stroke, Dr. Sacco and Dr. Turc said the study confirms that tenecteplase is associated with a high rate of recanalization.

“Fast recanalization with intravenous thrombolysis, endovascular treatment, proper patient selection, and combination with dual antiplatelet treatment or early initiation of anticoagulants may translate into tangible clinical benefits for patients with minor ischemic stroke, which should be tested in future studies,” they wrote.

This trial was funded by grants from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada, and the British Heart Foundation. Boehringer Ingelheim provided tenecteplase for the study. Dr. Coutts reported no conflicts of interest. Dr. Sacco reported receiving grants for research from Novartis and Uriach; consulting fees from Novartis, Allergan-AbbVie, Teva, Lilly, Lundbeck, Pfizer, Novo Nordisk, Abbott, and AstraZeneca; payment for lectures from Novartis, Allergan-AbbVie, Teva, Lilly, Lundbeck, Pfizer, Novo Nordisk, Abbott, and AstraZeneca; and support for attending conferences from Lilly, Novartis, Teva, Lundbeck, and Pfizer. She is president elect of the European Stroke Organization and editor-in-chief of Cephalalgia. Dr. Turc reported payment for lectures from Guerbet France, is a member of the scientific advisory board of AI-Stroke, and is the Secretary General of the European Stroke Organisation.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

BASEL, SWITZERLAND — Minor ischemic stroke patients with intracranial occlusion should not be treated with IV thrombolysis, a new trial has concluded.

Results from the randomized controlled trial TEMPO-2 showed no benefit from treatment with tenecteplase following ischemic stroke. In addition, investigators found a small increased risk for symptomatic intracranial hemorrhage (ICH) and more deaths in the tenecteplase group compared with the control group.

The research suggests that although it makes sense to open up vessels in patients with minor stroke, they didn’t do better with thrombolysis.

“This is not the result we were hoping for, but I think the question of whether to treat these minor stroke patients who are not disabled has now been answered,” said lead investigator Shelagh B. Coutts, MD, University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada.

“After these results, I think we should scan these patients, admit them, give them dual antiplatelet therapy and IV fluids, and watch them like a hawk. If they deteriorate, we can intervene at that point.”

The findings were presented at the European Stroke Organization Conference (ESOC) 2024 annual meeting and published online simultaneously in The Lancet.
 

Very Little Data

Up to half of patients with ischemic stroke initially present with minimal symptoms, which are not disabling, investigators noted. Despite having low scores on the National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS) that typically range from 0 to 5, a third of these patients are dead or disabled at 90-day follow-up if thrombolysis is withheld.

Patients with minor deficits and evidence of an intracranial occlusion are a subpopulation at a high risk for early neurological deterioration, which most often occurs within the first 24 hours after presentation.

However, many physicians have concerns about giving thrombolysis to these patients because of the potential harm from bleeding in the absence of major deficits, and most trials of thrombolysis have excluded patients with minor stroke. That leaves very little high-quality data to guide practice for these patients.

Two previous studies have compared alteplase with antiplatelet agents in minor stroke, but no trial has specifically looked at the subset of patients with minor stroke who have intracranial occlusion. The TEMPO-2 trial was conducted to evaluate the use of tenecteplase in this patient population.

The multicenter, parallel group, open-label study was conducted at 48 hospitals in Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, Finland, Ireland, New Zealand, Singapore, Spain, and the United Kingdom.

The trial included patients with minor acute ischemic stroke (NIHSS score of 0-5) and intracranial occlusion or focal perfusion abnormality who were within 12 hours from stroke onset.

Patients received IV tenecteplase (0.25 mg/kg) or non-thrombolytic standard of care (control). Most patients in the control group were treated with dual antiplatelet therapy with aspirin and clopidogrel (57%) or aspirin monotherapy (23%).

The trial was stopped early for futility after 886 patients had been enrolled. The median NIHSS score was 2.

The primary outcome — a return to baseline functioning on the modified Rankin Scale score at 90 days — occurred in 75% of the control group and in 72% of the tenecteplase group (risk ratio [RR], 0.96; P = .29).

Although there were significantly more patients with early recanalization and an NIHSS score of 0 at day 5 or discharge after tenecteplase treatment, this did not translate into improved functional outcomes at 90 days.

More patients died in the tenecteplase group compared with the control group (5% vs 1%; adjusted hazard ratio, 3.8; P = .0085).

There were eight (2%) symptomatic ICHs in the tenecteplase group versus two (< 1%) in the control group (RR, 4.2; P = .059).

The ICH rate was not different in patients treated after 4.5 hours versus before 4.5 hours. The subgroup of patients treated at 4.5-12.0 hours showed weaker evidence of better outcomes with thrombolysis than those treated before 4.5 hours, suggesting that the 12-hour window for TEMPO-2 did not explain the absence of benefit seen with tenecteplase.

Patients in the control group did better than expected, which may have been the result of chance, patient selection, or greater use of dual antiplatelet therapy, researchers noted.

Despite higher recanalization rates in the tenecteplase group (48% vs 22%), there was no change in the rate of stroke progression between groups, with an 8% rate of progression seen overall in the study.

Noting that previous studies have shown that patients with minor stroke and intracranial occlusion are at a risk for both progression and disability, the authors suggested that good supportive care may have improved outcomes in both groups.
 

More Trials Needed

Commenting on the study at the ESOC meeting, Urs Fischer, MD, Basel University Hospital, Switzerland, said “What should we do for patients with mild stroke with vessel occlusion has been a huge unanswered question. The TEMPO-2 study did not show a benefit with thrombolysis, and there was a tendency toward an increased risk of ICH. This is an important finding.”

In an accompanying editorial, Simona Sacco, MD, University of L’Aquila, Italy, and Guillaume Turc, MD, Université Paris Cité, France, noted that different minor ischemic stroke populations pose different therapeutic challenges.

Observational data suggest a benefit of endovascular treatment for minor stroke with large vessel occlusion, and dedicated randomized controlled trials in this group are ongoing, they added.

Early dual antiplatelet treatment is now the recommended treatment of minor stroke and should therefore be the active comparator for non-cardioembolic strokes in future trials.

While TEMPO-2 did not prove that tenecteplase is better than the standard of care for the acute treatment of minor stroke, Dr. Sacco and Dr. Turc said the study confirms that tenecteplase is associated with a high rate of recanalization.

“Fast recanalization with intravenous thrombolysis, endovascular treatment, proper patient selection, and combination with dual antiplatelet treatment or early initiation of anticoagulants may translate into tangible clinical benefits for patients with minor ischemic stroke, which should be tested in future studies,” they wrote.

This trial was funded by grants from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada, and the British Heart Foundation. Boehringer Ingelheim provided tenecteplase for the study. Dr. Coutts reported no conflicts of interest. Dr. Sacco reported receiving grants for research from Novartis and Uriach; consulting fees from Novartis, Allergan-AbbVie, Teva, Lilly, Lundbeck, Pfizer, Novo Nordisk, Abbott, and AstraZeneca; payment for lectures from Novartis, Allergan-AbbVie, Teva, Lilly, Lundbeck, Pfizer, Novo Nordisk, Abbott, and AstraZeneca; and support for attending conferences from Lilly, Novartis, Teva, Lundbeck, and Pfizer. She is president elect of the European Stroke Organization and editor-in-chief of Cephalalgia. Dr. Turc reported payment for lectures from Guerbet France, is a member of the scientific advisory board of AI-Stroke, and is the Secretary General of the European Stroke Organisation.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

BASEL, SWITZERLAND — Early reduction of blood pressure has a beneficial effect in hemorrhagic stroke but a detrimental effect in ischemic stroke, new trial data show. The findings could shake up recommendations on control of blood pressure in acute stroke patients. 

“This is the first time that we have randomized evidence of blood pressure control prior to reperfusion in ischemic stroke patients, and our data will challenge the current guidelines that recommend lowering blood pressure to below 180 mm Hg systolic in these patients,” said study coauthor Craig Anderson, MD, George Institute for Global Health, Sydney, Australia. 

“And this study also clearly shows for the first time that getting blood pressure under control in hemorrhagic stroke patients in the first couple of hours has definitive benefits,” he added.

The findings were presented on May 16 at the European Stroke Organization Conference (ESOC) annual meeting and published online simultaneously in The New England Journal of Medicine. 

A Test of Early BP Control

The trial was conducted to test the strategy of very early blood pressure control during patient transport in an ambulance after acute stroke, which investigators suspected could benefit patients with both types of stroke. 

The hypothesis was that this would reduce bleeding in the brain for those with hemorrhagic stroke. For ischemic stroke patients, it was thought this strategy would speed up administration of thrombolysis, because guidelines recommend bringing blood pressure under control before thrombolysis. 

For the INTERACT4 trial, which was conducted in China, 2404 patients with suspected acute stroke and elevated systolic blood pressure (≥ 150 mm Hg) who were assessed in the ambulance within 2 hours after symptom onset were randomized to receive immediate treatment with intravenous urapidil to lower the systolic blood pressure or usual blood pressure management (usual care group).

The median time between symptom onset and randomization was 61 minutes, and the mean blood pressure at randomization was 178/98 mm Hg. 

Stroke was subsequently confirmed by imaging in 2240 patients, of whom 46% had a hemorrhagic stroke and 54% an ischemic stroke. 

At the time of arrival at the hospital, the mean systolic blood pressure in the intervention group was 158 mm Hg, compared with 170 mm Hg in the usual care group. 

The primary efficacy outcome was functional status as assessed by modified Rankin scale score at 90 days. 

Overall, there was no difference between the two groups in terms of functional outcome scores (common odds ratio [OR], 1.00; 95% CI, 0.87-1.15), and the incidence of serious adverse events was similar. 

But the study showed very different results in patients with hemorrhagic stroke vs those with ischemic stroke. 

Prehospital reduction of blood pressure was associated with a decrease in the odds of a poor functional outcome among patients with hemorrhagic stroke (common OR, 0.75; 95% CI, 0.60-0.92) but an increase in poor outcomes among patients with cerebral ischemia (common OR, 1.30; 95% CI, 1.06-1.60).

‘Slam-Dunk’ Effect 

Anderson has led several previous trials of blood pressure control in stroke patients, some of which have suggested benefit of lowering blood pressure in those with hemorrhagic stroke, but he says the results of the current trial are more clear-cut.

“We have never seen such a slam-dunk effect as there was in INTERACT4,” Dr. Anderson said. “Not only did we show that early reduction of blood pressure in hemorrhagic stroke patients improved functional outcome, it also reduced bleeding in the brain, improved survival and quality of life, and reduced surgery and infection complications. That’s quite remarkable.”

The findings offer “clear evidence that for patients with hemorrhagic stroke, we must get the blood pressure under control as soon as possible and introduce systems of care to ensure this happens,” he added.

The reason for the clear findings in the current trial is probably the treatment time, Dr. Anderson said. 

“This is the first trial in which blood pressure has been controlled in the ambulance and occurred much earlier than in the previous trials.” 

Challenging Ischemic Stroke Guidelines

The INTERACT4 results in ischemic stroke patients are likely to be more controversial. 

“Our results are clearly challenging longstanding beliefs around blood pressure control in ischemic stroke prior to thrombolysis,” Dr. Anderson said. 

Current guidelines recommend a blood pressure < 185 mm Hg systolic before initiation of thrombolysis because of concerns about intracerebral hemorrhage, he noted. Often, blood pressure is lowered rapidly down to much lower levels in order give thrombolysis quickly. 

“Our results suggest this may not be a good idea,” Dr. Anderson said. “I think these data will shake us up a bit and make us more cautious about reducing blood pressure in these patients. Personally, I wouldn’t touch the blood pressure at all in ischemic stroke patients after these results.” 

He said the mechanisms behind the different stroke types would explain the results. 

“If a patient is bleeding, it makes sense that higher blood pressure would make that worse,” Dr. Anderson said. “But when a patient has a blocked artery and ischemia in the brain, it seems likely that the extra pressure is needed to keep oxygen delivery to the ischemic tissue.”

Accurate Diagnosis Necessary

Because it is not possible to make an accurate diagnosis between ischemic and hemorrhagic stroke without a CT scan, Dr. Anderson stressed that at the present time, no action on blood pressure can be taken in the ambulance. 

“There is a lot of interest in developing a lightweight brain scanner to be used in ambulances, but this won’t be routinely available for several years,” he said. “So for now, quick diagnosis of the type of stroke that is occurring on the patient’s arrival at the emergency department and, for hemorrhagic stroke patients, swift action to control blood pressure at this point is critical to preserving brain function.”

Commenting on the INTERACT4 results at the ESOC meeting, Simona Sacco, MD, professor of neurology at the University of L’Aquila, Italy, said this was a very important trial that would impact clinical practice. 

“The data really reinforce that hemorrhagic stroke patients must have their blood pressure reduced as soon as possible,” she stated. 

Dr. Sacco said the trial emphasizes the need to be able to distinguish between a hemorrhagic and ischemic stroke in a prehospital setting and supports the introduction of more mobile stroke units carrying CT scanners and calls for the development of biomarkers that can allow rapid differentiation between the two conditions. 

In an accompanying editorial, Jonathan Edlow, MD, Department of Emergency Medicine, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, points out several aspects of the trial that may potentially limit the generalizability of the findings. These include use of urapidil as the antihypertensive agent, which is unavailable in the United States; all patients being of Han Chinese ethnicity; and an unusually high sensitivity of initial CT scans in detecting visible signs of ischemia or infarction in patients in acute ischemic stroke. 

“These findings should be considered hypothesis-generating, and they make the case for validation of the trial results in other settings,” Dr. Edlow wrote. 

The INTERACT4 trial was funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia, the George Institute for Global Health, several Chinese healthcare institutions, and Takeda Pharmaceuticals China. Disclosures for study and editorial authors are provided in the original articles.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

BASEL, SWITZERLAND — Early reduction of blood pressure has a beneficial effect in hemorrhagic stroke but a detrimental effect in ischemic stroke, new trial data show. The findings could shake up recommendations on control of blood pressure in acute stroke patients. 

“This is the first time that we have randomized evidence of blood pressure control prior to reperfusion in ischemic stroke patients, and our data will challenge the current guidelines that recommend lowering blood pressure to below 180 mm Hg systolic in these patients,” said study coauthor Craig Anderson, MD, George Institute for Global Health, Sydney, Australia. 

“And this study also clearly shows for the first time that getting blood pressure under control in hemorrhagic stroke patients in the first couple of hours has definitive benefits,” he added.

The findings were presented on May 16 at the European Stroke Organization Conference (ESOC) annual meeting and published online simultaneously in The New England Journal of Medicine. 

A Test of Early BP Control

The trial was conducted to test the strategy of very early blood pressure control during patient transport in an ambulance after acute stroke, which investigators suspected could benefit patients with both types of stroke. 

The hypothesis was that this would reduce bleeding in the brain for those with hemorrhagic stroke. For ischemic stroke patients, it was thought this strategy would speed up administration of thrombolysis, because guidelines recommend bringing blood pressure under control before thrombolysis. 

For the INTERACT4 trial, which was conducted in China, 2404 patients with suspected acute stroke and elevated systolic blood pressure (≥ 150 mm Hg) who were assessed in the ambulance within 2 hours after symptom onset were randomized to receive immediate treatment with intravenous urapidil to lower the systolic blood pressure or usual blood pressure management (usual care group).

The median time between symptom onset and randomization was 61 minutes, and the mean blood pressure at randomization was 178/98 mm Hg. 

Stroke was subsequently confirmed by imaging in 2240 patients, of whom 46% had a hemorrhagic stroke and 54% an ischemic stroke. 

At the time of arrival at the hospital, the mean systolic blood pressure in the intervention group was 158 mm Hg, compared with 170 mm Hg in the usual care group. 

The primary efficacy outcome was functional status as assessed by modified Rankin scale score at 90 days. 

Overall, there was no difference between the two groups in terms of functional outcome scores (common odds ratio [OR], 1.00; 95% CI, 0.87-1.15), and the incidence of serious adverse events was similar. 

But the study showed very different results in patients with hemorrhagic stroke vs those with ischemic stroke. 

Prehospital reduction of blood pressure was associated with a decrease in the odds of a poor functional outcome among patients with hemorrhagic stroke (common OR, 0.75; 95% CI, 0.60-0.92) but an increase in poor outcomes among patients with cerebral ischemia (common OR, 1.30; 95% CI, 1.06-1.60).

‘Slam-Dunk’ Effect 

Anderson has led several previous trials of blood pressure control in stroke patients, some of which have suggested benefit of lowering blood pressure in those with hemorrhagic stroke, but he says the results of the current trial are more clear-cut.

“We have never seen such a slam-dunk effect as there was in INTERACT4,” Dr. Anderson said. “Not only did we show that early reduction of blood pressure in hemorrhagic stroke patients improved functional outcome, it also reduced bleeding in the brain, improved survival and quality of life, and reduced surgery and infection complications. That’s quite remarkable.”

The findings offer “clear evidence that for patients with hemorrhagic stroke, we must get the blood pressure under control as soon as possible and introduce systems of care to ensure this happens,” he added.

The reason for the clear findings in the current trial is probably the treatment time, Dr. Anderson said. 

“This is the first trial in which blood pressure has been controlled in the ambulance and occurred much earlier than in the previous trials.” 

Challenging Ischemic Stroke Guidelines

The INTERACT4 results in ischemic stroke patients are likely to be more controversial. 

“Our results are clearly challenging longstanding beliefs around blood pressure control in ischemic stroke prior to thrombolysis,” Dr. Anderson said. 

Current guidelines recommend a blood pressure < 185 mm Hg systolic before initiation of thrombolysis because of concerns about intracerebral hemorrhage, he noted. Often, blood pressure is lowered rapidly down to much lower levels in order give thrombolysis quickly. 

“Our results suggest this may not be a good idea,” Dr. Anderson said. “I think these data will shake us up a bit and make us more cautious about reducing blood pressure in these patients. Personally, I wouldn’t touch the blood pressure at all in ischemic stroke patients after these results.” 

He said the mechanisms behind the different stroke types would explain the results. 

“If a patient is bleeding, it makes sense that higher blood pressure would make that worse,” Dr. Anderson said. “But when a patient has a blocked artery and ischemia in the brain, it seems likely that the extra pressure is needed to keep oxygen delivery to the ischemic tissue.”

Accurate Diagnosis Necessary

Because it is not possible to make an accurate diagnosis between ischemic and hemorrhagic stroke without a CT scan, Dr. Anderson stressed that at the present time, no action on blood pressure can be taken in the ambulance. 

“There is a lot of interest in developing a lightweight brain scanner to be used in ambulances, but this won’t be routinely available for several years,” he said. “So for now, quick diagnosis of the type of stroke that is occurring on the patient’s arrival at the emergency department and, for hemorrhagic stroke patients, swift action to control blood pressure at this point is critical to preserving brain function.”

Commenting on the INTERACT4 results at the ESOC meeting, Simona Sacco, MD, professor of neurology at the University of L’Aquila, Italy, said this was a very important trial that would impact clinical practice. 

“The data really reinforce that hemorrhagic stroke patients must have their blood pressure reduced as soon as possible,” she stated. 

Dr. Sacco said the trial emphasizes the need to be able to distinguish between a hemorrhagic and ischemic stroke in a prehospital setting and supports the introduction of more mobile stroke units carrying CT scanners and calls for the development of biomarkers that can allow rapid differentiation between the two conditions. 

In an accompanying editorial, Jonathan Edlow, MD, Department of Emergency Medicine, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, points out several aspects of the trial that may potentially limit the generalizability of the findings. These include use of urapidil as the antihypertensive agent, which is unavailable in the United States; all patients being of Han Chinese ethnicity; and an unusually high sensitivity of initial CT scans in detecting visible signs of ischemia or infarction in patients in acute ischemic stroke. 

“These findings should be considered hypothesis-generating, and they make the case for validation of the trial results in other settings,” Dr. Edlow wrote. 

The INTERACT4 trial was funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia, the George Institute for Global Health, several Chinese healthcare institutions, and Takeda Pharmaceuticals China. Disclosures for study and editorial authors are provided in the original articles.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

BASEL, SWITZERLAND — Early reduction of blood pressure has a beneficial effect in hemorrhagic stroke but a detrimental effect in ischemic stroke, new trial data show. The findings could shake up recommendations on control of blood pressure in acute stroke patients. 

“This is the first time that we have randomized evidence of blood pressure control prior to reperfusion in ischemic stroke patients, and our data will challenge the current guidelines that recommend lowering blood pressure to below 180 mm Hg systolic in these patients,” said study coauthor Craig Anderson, MD, George Institute for Global Health, Sydney, Australia. 

“And this study also clearly shows for the first time that getting blood pressure under control in hemorrhagic stroke patients in the first couple of hours has definitive benefits,” he added.

The findings were presented on May 16 at the European Stroke Organization Conference (ESOC) annual meeting and published online simultaneously in The New England Journal of Medicine. 

A Test of Early BP Control

The trial was conducted to test the strategy of very early blood pressure control during patient transport in an ambulance after acute stroke, which investigators suspected could benefit patients with both types of stroke. 

The hypothesis was that this would reduce bleeding in the brain for those with hemorrhagic stroke. For ischemic stroke patients, it was thought this strategy would speed up administration of thrombolysis, because guidelines recommend bringing blood pressure under control before thrombolysis. 

For the INTERACT4 trial, which was conducted in China, 2404 patients with suspected acute stroke and elevated systolic blood pressure (≥ 150 mm Hg) who were assessed in the ambulance within 2 hours after symptom onset were randomized to receive immediate treatment with intravenous urapidil to lower the systolic blood pressure or usual blood pressure management (usual care group).

The median time between symptom onset and randomization was 61 minutes, and the mean blood pressure at randomization was 178/98 mm Hg. 

Stroke was subsequently confirmed by imaging in 2240 patients, of whom 46% had a hemorrhagic stroke and 54% an ischemic stroke. 

At the time of arrival at the hospital, the mean systolic blood pressure in the intervention group was 158 mm Hg, compared with 170 mm Hg in the usual care group. 

The primary efficacy outcome was functional status as assessed by modified Rankin scale score at 90 days. 

Overall, there was no difference between the two groups in terms of functional outcome scores (common odds ratio [OR], 1.00; 95% CI, 0.87-1.15), and the incidence of serious adverse events was similar. 

But the study showed very different results in patients with hemorrhagic stroke vs those with ischemic stroke. 

Prehospital reduction of blood pressure was associated with a decrease in the odds of a poor functional outcome among patients with hemorrhagic stroke (common OR, 0.75; 95% CI, 0.60-0.92) but an increase in poor outcomes among patients with cerebral ischemia (common OR, 1.30; 95% CI, 1.06-1.60).

‘Slam-Dunk’ Effect 

Anderson has led several previous trials of blood pressure control in stroke patients, some of which have suggested benefit of lowering blood pressure in those with hemorrhagic stroke, but he says the results of the current trial are more clear-cut.

“We have never seen such a slam-dunk effect as there was in INTERACT4,” Dr. Anderson said. “Not only did we show that early reduction of blood pressure in hemorrhagic stroke patients improved functional outcome, it also reduced bleeding in the brain, improved survival and quality of life, and reduced surgery and infection complications. That’s quite remarkable.”

The findings offer “clear evidence that for patients with hemorrhagic stroke, we must get the blood pressure under control as soon as possible and introduce systems of care to ensure this happens,” he added.

The reason for the clear findings in the current trial is probably the treatment time, Dr. Anderson said. 

“This is the first trial in which blood pressure has been controlled in the ambulance and occurred much earlier than in the previous trials.” 

Challenging Ischemic Stroke Guidelines

The INTERACT4 results in ischemic stroke patients are likely to be more controversial. 

“Our results are clearly challenging longstanding beliefs around blood pressure control in ischemic stroke prior to thrombolysis,” Dr. Anderson said. 

Current guidelines recommend a blood pressure < 185 mm Hg systolic before initiation of thrombolysis because of concerns about intracerebral hemorrhage, he noted. Often, blood pressure is lowered rapidly down to much lower levels in order give thrombolysis quickly. 

“Our results suggest this may not be a good idea,” Dr. Anderson said. “I think these data will shake us up a bit and make us more cautious about reducing blood pressure in these patients. Personally, I wouldn’t touch the blood pressure at all in ischemic stroke patients after these results.” 

He said the mechanisms behind the different stroke types would explain the results. 

“If a patient is bleeding, it makes sense that higher blood pressure would make that worse,” Dr. Anderson said. “But when a patient has a blocked artery and ischemia in the brain, it seems likely that the extra pressure is needed to keep oxygen delivery to the ischemic tissue.”

Accurate Diagnosis Necessary

Because it is not possible to make an accurate diagnosis between ischemic and hemorrhagic stroke without a CT scan, Dr. Anderson stressed that at the present time, no action on blood pressure can be taken in the ambulance. 

“There is a lot of interest in developing a lightweight brain scanner to be used in ambulances, but this won’t be routinely available for several years,” he said. “So for now, quick diagnosis of the type of stroke that is occurring on the patient’s arrival at the emergency department and, for hemorrhagic stroke patients, swift action to control blood pressure at this point is critical to preserving brain function.”

Commenting on the INTERACT4 results at the ESOC meeting, Simona Sacco, MD, professor of neurology at the University of L’Aquila, Italy, said this was a very important trial that would impact clinical practice. 

“The data really reinforce that hemorrhagic stroke patients must have their blood pressure reduced as soon as possible,” she stated. 

Dr. Sacco said the trial emphasizes the need to be able to distinguish between a hemorrhagic and ischemic stroke in a prehospital setting and supports the introduction of more mobile stroke units carrying CT scanners and calls for the development of biomarkers that can allow rapid differentiation between the two conditions. 

In an accompanying editorial, Jonathan Edlow, MD, Department of Emergency Medicine, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, points out several aspects of the trial that may potentially limit the generalizability of the findings. These include use of urapidil as the antihypertensive agent, which is unavailable in the United States; all patients being of Han Chinese ethnicity; and an unusually high sensitivity of initial CT scans in detecting visible signs of ischemia or infarction in patients in acute ischemic stroke. 

“These findings should be considered hypothesis-generating, and they make the case for validation of the trial results in other settings,” Dr. Edlow wrote. 

The INTERACT4 trial was funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia, the George Institute for Global Health, several Chinese healthcare institutions, and Takeda Pharmaceuticals China. Disclosures for study and editorial authors are provided in the original articles.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

For years, researchers and medical companies have explored low-field MRI systems (those with a magnetic field strength of less than 1 T) — searching for a feasible alternative to the loud, expensive machines requiring special rooms with shielding to block their powerful magnetic field.

Most low-field scanners in development are for brain scans only. In 2022, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) cleared the first portable MRI system — Hyperfine’s Swoop, designed for use at a patient’s bedside — for head and brain scans. But the technology has not been applied to whole-body MRI — until now.

In a new study published in Science, researchers from Hong Kong described a whole-body, ultra low–field MRI.

“This is a big breakthrough,” said Kevin Sheth, MD, director of the Yale Center for Brain & Mind Health, who was not involved in the study. “It is one of the first, if not the first, demonstrations of low-field MRI imaging for the entire body.”

The device uses a 0.05 T magnet — one sixtieth the magnetic field strength of the standard 3 T MRI model common in hospitals today, said lead author Ed Wu, PhD, professor of biomedical engineering at The University of Hong Kong.

Because the field strength is so low, no protective shielding is needed. Patients and bystanders can safely use smart phones . And the scanner is safe for patients with implanted devices, like a cochlear implant or pacemaker, or any metal on their body or clothes. No hearing protection is required, either, because the machine is so quiet.

If all goes well, the technology could be commercially available in as little as a few years, Dr. Wu said.

But first, funding and FDA approval would be needed. “A company is going to have to come along and say, ‘This looks fantastic. We’re going to commercialize this, and we’re going to go through this certification process,’ ” said Andrew Webb, PhD, professor of radiology and the founding director of the C.J. Gorter MRI Center at the Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, the Netherlands. (Dr. Webb was not involved in the study.)
 

Improving Access to MRI

One hope for this technology is to bring MRI to more people worldwide. Africa has less than one MRI scanner per million residents, whereas the United States has about 40.

While a new 3 T machine can cost about $1 million, the low-field version is much cheaper — only about $22,000 in materials cost per scanner, according to Dr. Wu.

A low magnetic field means less electricity, too — the machine can be plugged into a standard wall outlet. And because a fully shielded room isn’t needed, that could save another $100,000 in materials, Dr. Webb said.

Its ease of use could improve accessibility in countries with limited training, Dr. Webb pointed out.

“To be a technician is 2-3 years training for a regular MRI machine, a lot of it to do safety, a lot of it to do very subtle planning,” said Webb. “These [low-field] systems are much simpler.”
 

Challenges and the Future

The prototype weighs about 1.5 tons or 3000 lb. (A 3 T MRI can weigh between 6 and 13 tons or 12,000 and 26,000 lb.) That might sound like a lot, but it’s comparable to a mobile CT scanner, which is designed to be moved from room to room. Plus, “its weight can be substantially reduced if further optimized,” Dr. Wu said.

One challenge with low-field MRIs is image quality, which tends to be not as clear and detailed as those from high-power machines. To address this, the research team used deep learning (artificial intelligence) to enhance the image quality. “Computing power and large-scale data underpin our success, which tackles the physics and math problems that are traditionally considered intractable in existing MRI methodology,” Dr. Wu said.

Dr. Webb said he was impressed by the image quality shown in the study. They “look much higher quality than you would expect from such a low-field system,” he said. Still, only healthy volunteers were scanned. The true test will be using it to view subtle pathologies, Dr. Webb said.

That’s what Dr. Wu and his team are working on now — taking scans to diagnose various medical conditions. His group’s brain-only version of the low-field MRI has been used for diagnosis, he noted.
 

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

For years, researchers and medical companies have explored low-field MRI systems (those with a magnetic field strength of less than 1 T) — searching for a feasible alternative to the loud, expensive machines requiring special rooms with shielding to block their powerful magnetic field.

Most low-field scanners in development are for brain scans only. In 2022, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) cleared the first portable MRI system — Hyperfine’s Swoop, designed for use at a patient’s bedside — for head and brain scans. But the technology has not been applied to whole-body MRI — until now.

In a new study published in Science, researchers from Hong Kong described a whole-body, ultra low–field MRI.

“This is a big breakthrough,” said Kevin Sheth, MD, director of the Yale Center for Brain & Mind Health, who was not involved in the study. “It is one of the first, if not the first, demonstrations of low-field MRI imaging for the entire body.”

The device uses a 0.05 T magnet — one sixtieth the magnetic field strength of the standard 3 T MRI model common in hospitals today, said lead author Ed Wu, PhD, professor of biomedical engineering at The University of Hong Kong.

Because the field strength is so low, no protective shielding is needed. Patients and bystanders can safely use smart phones . And the scanner is safe for patients with implanted devices, like a cochlear implant or pacemaker, or any metal on their body or clothes. No hearing protection is required, either, because the machine is so quiet.

If all goes well, the technology could be commercially available in as little as a few years, Dr. Wu said.

But first, funding and FDA approval would be needed. “A company is going to have to come along and say, ‘This looks fantastic. We’re going to commercialize this, and we’re going to go through this certification process,’ ” said Andrew Webb, PhD, professor of radiology and the founding director of the C.J. Gorter MRI Center at the Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, the Netherlands. (Dr. Webb was not involved in the study.)
 

Improving Access to MRI

One hope for this technology is to bring MRI to more people worldwide. Africa has less than one MRI scanner per million residents, whereas the United States has about 40.

While a new 3 T machine can cost about $1 million, the low-field version is much cheaper — only about $22,000 in materials cost per scanner, according to Dr. Wu.

A low magnetic field means less electricity, too — the machine can be plugged into a standard wall outlet. And because a fully shielded room isn’t needed, that could save another $100,000 in materials, Dr. Webb said.

Its ease of use could improve accessibility in countries with limited training, Dr. Webb pointed out.

“To be a technician is 2-3 years training for a regular MRI machine, a lot of it to do safety, a lot of it to do very subtle planning,” said Webb. “These [low-field] systems are much simpler.”
 

Challenges and the Future

The prototype weighs about 1.5 tons or 3000 lb. (A 3 T MRI can weigh between 6 and 13 tons or 12,000 and 26,000 lb.) That might sound like a lot, but it’s comparable to a mobile CT scanner, which is designed to be moved from room to room. Plus, “its weight can be substantially reduced if further optimized,” Dr. Wu said.

One challenge with low-field MRIs is image quality, which tends to be not as clear and detailed as those from high-power machines. To address this, the research team used deep learning (artificial intelligence) to enhance the image quality. “Computing power and large-scale data underpin our success, which tackles the physics and math problems that are traditionally considered intractable in existing MRI methodology,” Dr. Wu said.

Dr. Webb said he was impressed by the image quality shown in the study. They “look much higher quality than you would expect from such a low-field system,” he said. Still, only healthy volunteers were scanned. The true test will be using it to view subtle pathologies, Dr. Webb said.

That’s what Dr. Wu and his team are working on now — taking scans to diagnose various medical conditions. His group’s brain-only version of the low-field MRI has been used for diagnosis, he noted.
 

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

For years, researchers and medical companies have explored low-field MRI systems (those with a magnetic field strength of less than 1 T) — searching for a feasible alternative to the loud, expensive machines requiring special rooms with shielding to block their powerful magnetic field.

Most low-field scanners in development are for brain scans only. In 2022, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) cleared the first portable MRI system — Hyperfine’s Swoop, designed for use at a patient’s bedside — for head and brain scans. But the technology has not been applied to whole-body MRI — until now.

In a new study published in Science, researchers from Hong Kong described a whole-body, ultra low–field MRI.

“This is a big breakthrough,” said Kevin Sheth, MD, director of the Yale Center for Brain & Mind Health, who was not involved in the study. “It is one of the first, if not the first, demonstrations of low-field MRI imaging for the entire body.”

The device uses a 0.05 T magnet — one sixtieth the magnetic field strength of the standard 3 T MRI model common in hospitals today, said lead author Ed Wu, PhD, professor of biomedical engineering at The University of Hong Kong.

Because the field strength is so low, no protective shielding is needed. Patients and bystanders can safely use smart phones . And the scanner is safe for patients with implanted devices, like a cochlear implant or pacemaker, or any metal on their body or clothes. No hearing protection is required, either, because the machine is so quiet.

If all goes well, the technology could be commercially available in as little as a few years, Dr. Wu said.

But first, funding and FDA approval would be needed. “A company is going to have to come along and say, ‘This looks fantastic. We’re going to commercialize this, and we’re going to go through this certification process,’ ” said Andrew Webb, PhD, professor of radiology and the founding director of the C.J. Gorter MRI Center at the Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, the Netherlands. (Dr. Webb was not involved in the study.)
 

Improving Access to MRI

One hope for this technology is to bring MRI to more people worldwide. Africa has less than one MRI scanner per million residents, whereas the United States has about 40.

While a new 3 T machine can cost about $1 million, the low-field version is much cheaper — only about $22,000 in materials cost per scanner, according to Dr. Wu.

A low magnetic field means less electricity, too — the machine can be plugged into a standard wall outlet. And because a fully shielded room isn’t needed, that could save another $100,000 in materials, Dr. Webb said.

Its ease of use could improve accessibility in countries with limited training, Dr. Webb pointed out.

“To be a technician is 2-3 years training for a regular MRI machine, a lot of it to do safety, a lot of it to do very subtle planning,” said Webb. “These [low-field] systems are much simpler.”
 

Challenges and the Future

The prototype weighs about 1.5 tons or 3000 lb. (A 3 T MRI can weigh between 6 and 13 tons or 12,000 and 26,000 lb.) That might sound like a lot, but it’s comparable to a mobile CT scanner, which is designed to be moved from room to room. Plus, “its weight can be substantially reduced if further optimized,” Dr. Wu said.

One challenge with low-field MRIs is image quality, which tends to be not as clear and detailed as those from high-power machines. To address this, the research team used deep learning (artificial intelligence) to enhance the image quality. “Computing power and large-scale data underpin our success, which tackles the physics and math problems that are traditionally considered intractable in existing MRI methodology,” Dr. Wu said.

Dr. Webb said he was impressed by the image quality shown in the study. They “look much higher quality than you would expect from such a low-field system,” he said. Still, only healthy volunteers were scanned. The true test will be using it to view subtle pathologies, Dr. Webb said.

That’s what Dr. Wu and his team are working on now — taking scans to diagnose various medical conditions. His group’s brain-only version of the low-field MRI has been used for diagnosis, he noted.
 

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

TOPLINE:

Higher doses of nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) increase the risk for cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) such as ischemic heart disease, stroke, and congestive heart failure in patients with ankylosing spondylitis (AS) compared with lower doses.

METHODOLOGY:

• NSAIDs can suppress inflammation and relieve pain in patients with AS, but long-term treatment with NSAIDs poses concerns regarding gastrointestinal and renal toxicities and increased CVD risk.
• This nationwide cohort study used data from the Korean National Health Insurance database to investigate the risk for CVD associated with an increasing NSAID dosage in a real-world AS cohort.
• Investigators recruited 19,775 patients (mean age, 36.1 years; 75% men) with newly diagnosed AS and without any prior CVD between January 2010 and December 2018, among whom 99.7% received NSAID treatment and 30.2% received tumor necrosis factor inhibitor treatment.
• A time-varying approach was used to assess the NSAID exposure, wherein periods of NSAID use were defined as “NSAID-exposed” and periods longer than 1 month without NSAID use were defined as “NSAID-unexposed.”
• The primary outcome was the composite outcome of ischemic heart disease, stroke, or congestive heart failure.

TAKEAWAY:

• During the follow-up period of 98,290 person-years, 1663 cases of CVD were identified, which included 1157 cases of ischemic heart disease, 301 cases of stroke, and 613 cases of congestive heart failure.
• After adjusting for confounders, each defined daily dose increase in NSAIDs raised the risk for incident CVD by 10% (adjusted hazard ratio [aHR], 1.10; 95% CI, 1.08-1.13).
• Similarly, increasing the dose of NSAIDs was associated with an increased risk for ischemic heart disease (aHR, 1.08; 95% CI, 1.05-1.11), stroke (aHR, 1.09; 95% CI, 1.04-1.15), and congestive heart failure (aHR, 1.12; 95% CI, 1.08-1.16).
• The association between increasing NSAID dose and increased CVD risk was consistent across various subgroups, with NSAIDs posing a greater threat to cardiovascular health in women than in men.

IN PRACTICE:

The authors wrote, “Taken together, these results suggest that increasing the dose of NSAIDs is associated with a higher cardiovascular risk in AS, but that the increased risk might be lower than that in the general population.”

SOURCE:

First author Ji-Won Kim, MD, PhD, of the Division of Rheumatology, Department of Internal Medicine, Daegu Catholic University School of Medicine, Daegu, the Republic of Korea, and colleagues had their work published online on April 9 in Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases.

LIMITATIONS:

The study was of retrospective nature. The levels of acute phase reactants and AS disease activity could not be determined owing to a lack of data in the National Health Insurance database. The accuracy of the diagnosis of cardiovascular outcomes on the basis of the International Classification of Disease codes was also questionable.

DISCLOSURES:

The study was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea. The authors declared no conflicts of interest.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

TOPLINE:

Higher doses of nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) increase the risk for cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) such as ischemic heart disease, stroke, and congestive heart failure in patients with ankylosing spondylitis (AS) compared with lower doses.

METHODOLOGY:

• NSAIDs can suppress inflammation and relieve pain in patients with AS, but long-term treatment with NSAIDs poses concerns regarding gastrointestinal and renal toxicities and increased CVD risk.
• This nationwide cohort study used data from the Korean National Health Insurance database to investigate the risk for CVD associated with an increasing NSAID dosage in a real-world AS cohort.
• Investigators recruited 19,775 patients (mean age, 36.1 years; 75% men) with newly diagnosed AS and without any prior CVD between January 2010 and December 2018, among whom 99.7% received NSAID treatment and 30.2% received tumor necrosis factor inhibitor treatment.
• A time-varying approach was used to assess the NSAID exposure, wherein periods of NSAID use were defined as “NSAID-exposed” and periods longer than 1 month without NSAID use were defined as “NSAID-unexposed.”
• The primary outcome was the composite outcome of ischemic heart disease, stroke, or congestive heart failure.

TAKEAWAY:

• During the follow-up period of 98,290 person-years, 1663 cases of CVD were identified, which included 1157 cases of ischemic heart disease, 301 cases of stroke, and 613 cases of congestive heart failure.
• After adjusting for confounders, each defined daily dose increase in NSAIDs raised the risk for incident CVD by 10% (adjusted hazard ratio [aHR], 1.10; 95% CI, 1.08-1.13).
• Similarly, increasing the dose of NSAIDs was associated with an increased risk for ischemic heart disease (aHR, 1.08; 95% CI, 1.05-1.11), stroke (aHR, 1.09; 95% CI, 1.04-1.15), and congestive heart failure (aHR, 1.12; 95% CI, 1.08-1.16).
• The association between increasing NSAID dose and increased CVD risk was consistent across various subgroups, with NSAIDs posing a greater threat to cardiovascular health in women than in men.

IN PRACTICE:

The authors wrote, “Taken together, these results suggest that increasing the dose of NSAIDs is associated with a higher cardiovascular risk in AS, but that the increased risk might be lower than that in the general population.”

SOURCE:

First author Ji-Won Kim, MD, PhD, of the Division of Rheumatology, Department of Internal Medicine, Daegu Catholic University School of Medicine, Daegu, the Republic of Korea, and colleagues had their work published online on April 9 in Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases.

LIMITATIONS:

The study was of retrospective nature. The levels of acute phase reactants and AS disease activity could not be determined owing to a lack of data in the National Health Insurance database. The accuracy of the diagnosis of cardiovascular outcomes on the basis of the International Classification of Disease codes was also questionable.

DISCLOSURES:

The study was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea. The authors declared no conflicts of interest.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

TOPLINE:

Higher doses of nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) increase the risk for cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) such as ischemic heart disease, stroke, and congestive heart failure in patients with ankylosing spondylitis (AS) compared with lower doses.

METHODOLOGY:

• NSAIDs can suppress inflammation and relieve pain in patients with AS, but long-term treatment with NSAIDs poses concerns regarding gastrointestinal and renal toxicities and increased CVD risk.
• This nationwide cohort study used data from the Korean National Health Insurance database to investigate the risk for CVD associated with an increasing NSAID dosage in a real-world AS cohort.
• Investigators recruited 19,775 patients (mean age, 36.1 years; 75% men) with newly diagnosed AS and without any prior CVD between January 2010 and December 2018, among whom 99.7% received NSAID treatment and 30.2% received tumor necrosis factor inhibitor treatment.
• A time-varying approach was used to assess the NSAID exposure, wherein periods of NSAID use were defined as “NSAID-exposed” and periods longer than 1 month without NSAID use were defined as “NSAID-unexposed.”
• The primary outcome was the composite outcome of ischemic heart disease, stroke, or congestive heart failure.

TAKEAWAY:

• During the follow-up period of 98,290 person-years, 1663 cases of CVD were identified, which included 1157 cases of ischemic heart disease, 301 cases of stroke, and 613 cases of congestive heart failure.
• After adjusting for confounders, each defined daily dose increase in NSAIDs raised the risk for incident CVD by 10% (adjusted hazard ratio [aHR], 1.10; 95% CI, 1.08-1.13).
• Similarly, increasing the dose of NSAIDs was associated with an increased risk for ischemic heart disease (aHR, 1.08; 95% CI, 1.05-1.11), stroke (aHR, 1.09; 95% CI, 1.04-1.15), and congestive heart failure (aHR, 1.12; 95% CI, 1.08-1.16).
• The association between increasing NSAID dose and increased CVD risk was consistent across various subgroups, with NSAIDs posing a greater threat to cardiovascular health in women than in men.

IN PRACTICE:

The authors wrote, “Taken together, these results suggest that increasing the dose of NSAIDs is associated with a higher cardiovascular risk in AS, but that the increased risk might be lower than that in the general population.”

SOURCE:

First author Ji-Won Kim, MD, PhD, of the Division of Rheumatology, Department of Internal Medicine, Daegu Catholic University School of Medicine, Daegu, the Republic of Korea, and colleagues had their work published online on April 9 in Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases.

LIMITATIONS:

The study was of retrospective nature. The levels of acute phase reactants and AS disease activity could not be determined owing to a lack of data in the National Health Insurance database. The accuracy of the diagnosis of cardiovascular outcomes on the basis of the International Classification of Disease codes was also questionable.

DISCLOSURES:

The study was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea. The authors declared no conflicts of interest.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

New research by Thomas Münzel, MD, senior professor of cardiology at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz in Mainz, Germany, and colleagues again emphasized the harmful effects of noise on the heart and blood vessels. An analysis of current epidemiologic data provided strong indications that transportation noise is closely related to cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, according to a statement on the data analysis. The results were published in Circulation Research.

Morbidity and Mortality

Epidemiologic studies have shown that road, rail, or air traffic noise increases the risk for cardiovascular morbidity and mortality, with strong evidence for ischemic heart disease, heart failure, and stroke, according to the scientists. The World Health Organization reported that at least 1.6 million healthy life years are lost annually in Western Europe because of traffic-related noise. Nighttime traffic noise leads to sleep fragmentation and shortening, an increase in stress hormone levels, and increased oxidative stress in the vessels and brain. These factors could favor vascular (endothelial) dysfunction, inflammation, and hypertension, thereby increasing cardiovascular risk.

Consequences and Pathomechanisms

In the current publication, the authors provided an overview of epidemiologic research on the effects of transportation noise on cardiovascular risk factors and diseases, discussed mechanistic insights from the latest clinical and experimental studies, and proposed new risk markers to address noise-induced cardiovascular effects in the general population. An integrated analysis in the article demonstrated that for every 10 dB(A) increase, the risk for cardiovascular diseases such as heart attack, stroke, and heart failure significantly increases by 3.2%.

The authors also explained the possible effects of noise on changes in gene networks, epigenetic pathways, circadian rhythms, signal transmission along the neuronal-cardiovascular axis, oxidative stress, inflammation, and metabolism. Finally, current and future noise protection strategies are described, and the existing evidence on noise as a cardiovascular risk factor is discussed.

Confirmed Cardiovascular Risk Factor

“As an increasing proportion of the population is exposed to harmful traffic noise, efforts to reduce noise and laws for noise reduction are of great importance for future public health,” said Dr. Münzel. “It is also important for us that due to the strong evidence, traffic noise is finally recognized as a risk factor for cardiovascular diseases.”

Heart Attack Outcomes

Dr. Münzel and other researchers from Mainz have been studying the cardiovascular consequences of air pollution and traffic noise for several years. For example, they found that heart attacks in people and animals exposed to high noise levels earlier in life healed poorly. These results were published last year in Cardiovascular Research. According to the authors, the findings suggest that traffic noise may play a significant role in the development and course of coronary heart disease, such as after a heart attack.

The scientists initially found in animal experiments that exposure to aircraft noise for 4 days led to increased inflammation in the vessels. Compared with mice not exposed to aircraft noise, the noise-exposed animals showed an increase in free radicals; these animals exhibited a significant inflammatory response and had impaired vessel function.

The researchers explained that the experimental data showed aircraft noise alone triggers a proinflammatory transcription program that promotes the infiltration of immune cells into cardiovascular tissue in animals with acute myocardial infarction. They noted an increased infiltration of CD45+ cells into the vessels and heart, dominated by neutrophils in vessel tissue and Ly6Chigh monocytes in heart tissue. This infiltration creates a proinflammatory milieu that adversely affects the outcome after myocardial infarction by predisposing the heart tissue to greater ischemic damage and functional impairment. Exposure of animals to aircraft noise before induction of myocardial infarction by left anterior descending (LAD) coronary artery ligation impaired left ventricular function and increased infarct size after cardiac ischemia. In addition, noise exposure exacerbated infarct-induced endothelial dysfunction of peripheral vessels as early as 24 hours after LAD ligation.

Clinical Confirmation

These experimental results were confirmed by observations in the population-based Gutenberg Health Study. The researchers analyzed data from 100 patients with heart attack. The lead and senior authors of the study Michael Molitor, MD, and Philip Wenzel, MD, of the University of Mainz, explained, “From our studies, we have learned that exposure to aircraft noise before a heart attack significantly amplifies subsequent cardiovascular inflammation and exacerbates ischemic heart failure, which is favored by inflammation-promoting vascular conditioning. Our translational results show that people who have been exposed to noise in the past have a worse course if they experience a heart attack later in life.”

Study participants who had experienced a heart attack in their medical history had elevated levels of C-reactive protein if they had been exposed to aircraft noise in the past and subsequently developed noise annoyance reactions (0.305 vs 1.5; P = .0094). In addition, left ventricular ejection fraction in these patients after a heart attack was worse than that in patients with infarction without noise exposure in their medical history (62.5 vs 65.6; P = .0053).

The results suggest that measures to reduce environmental noise could help improve the clinical outcomes of heart attack patients, according to the authors.

Mental Health Effects

Traffic noise also may be associated with an increased risk for depression and anxiety disorders, as reported 2 years ago by the German Society for Psychosomatic Medicine and Medical Psychotherapy. Evolution has programmed the human organism to perceive noises as indicators of potential sources of danger — even during sleep. “Noise puts the body on alert,” explained Manfred E. Beutel, MD, director of the Clinic for Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy at the University of Mainz. As a result, the autonomic nervous system activates stress hormones such as adrenaline and cortisol, leading to an increase in heart rate and blood pressure. If noise becomes chronic, chronic diseases can develop. “Indeed, observational and experimental studies have shown that persistent noise annoyance promotes incident hypertension, cardiovascular diseases, and type 2 diabetes,” said Dr. Beutel.

Depression Risk Doubled

Among the negative effects of noise annoyance are also mental illnesses, as has become increasingly clear. “Noise annoyance disrupts daily activities and interferes with feelings and thoughts, sleep, and recovery,” said Dr. Beutel. The interruptions trigger negative emotional reactions such as anger, distress, exhaustion, flight impulses, and stress symptoms. “Such conditions promote the development of depression over time,” said Dr. Beutel. This observation was confirmed by the large-scale Gutenberg Health Study using the example of the Mainz population, which suffers to a large extent from noise annoyance because of the nearby Frankfurt Airport. “With increasing noise annoyance, the rates of depression and anxiety disorders steadily increased, until the risks eventually doubled with extreme annoyance,” said Dr. Beutel. Other studies point in the same direction. For example, a meta-analysis found a 12% increase in the risk for depression per 10-dB increase in noise. Another study found an association between nocturnal noise annoyance and the use of antidepressants.

Fine Particulate Matter

According to an evaluation of the Gutenberg Study, people perceive noise annoyance from aircraft noise as the most pronounced, followed by road, neighborhood, industrial, and railway noise. Noise occurs most frequently in urban areas that also produce air pollution such as fine particulate matter. “Fine particulate matter is also suspected of promoting anxiety and depression,” said Dr. Beutel, “because the small particles of fine particulate matter can enter the bloodstream and trigger inflammatory processes there, which in turn are closely related to depression.”

This story was translated from Univadis Germany, which is part of the Medscape professional network, using several editorial tools, including AI, as part of the process. Human editors reviewed this content before publication. A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

New research by Thomas Münzel, MD, senior professor of cardiology at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz in Mainz, Germany, and colleagues again emphasized the harmful effects of noise on the heart and blood vessels. An analysis of current epidemiologic data provided strong indications that transportation noise is closely related to cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, according to a statement on the data analysis. The results were published in Circulation Research.

Morbidity and Mortality

Epidemiologic studies have shown that road, rail, or air traffic noise increases the risk for cardiovascular morbidity and mortality, with strong evidence for ischemic heart disease, heart failure, and stroke, according to the scientists. The World Health Organization reported that at least 1.6 million healthy life years are lost annually in Western Europe because of traffic-related noise. Nighttime traffic noise leads to sleep fragmentation and shortening, an increase in stress hormone levels, and increased oxidative stress in the vessels and brain. These factors could favor vascular (endothelial) dysfunction, inflammation, and hypertension, thereby increasing cardiovascular risk.

Consequences and Pathomechanisms

In the current publication, the authors provided an overview of epidemiologic research on the effects of transportation noise on cardiovascular risk factors and diseases, discussed mechanistic insights from the latest clinical and experimental studies, and proposed new risk markers to address noise-induced cardiovascular effects in the general population. An integrated analysis in the article demonstrated that for every 10 dB(A) increase, the risk for cardiovascular diseases such as heart attack, stroke, and heart failure significantly increases by 3.2%.

The authors also explained the possible effects of noise on changes in gene networks, epigenetic pathways, circadian rhythms, signal transmission along the neuronal-cardiovascular axis, oxidative stress, inflammation, and metabolism. Finally, current and future noise protection strategies are described, and the existing evidence on noise as a cardiovascular risk factor is discussed.

Confirmed Cardiovascular Risk Factor

“As an increasing proportion of the population is exposed to harmful traffic noise, efforts to reduce noise and laws for noise reduction are of great importance for future public health,” said Dr. Münzel. “It is also important for us that due to the strong evidence, traffic noise is finally recognized as a risk factor for cardiovascular diseases.”

Heart Attack Outcomes

Dr. Münzel and other researchers from Mainz have been studying the cardiovascular consequences of air pollution and traffic noise for several years. For example, they found that heart attacks in people and animals exposed to high noise levels earlier in life healed poorly. These results were published last year in Cardiovascular Research. According to the authors, the findings suggest that traffic noise may play a significant role in the development and course of coronary heart disease, such as after a heart attack.

The scientists initially found in animal experiments that exposure to aircraft noise for 4 days led to increased inflammation in the vessels. Compared with mice not exposed to aircraft noise, the noise-exposed animals showed an increase in free radicals; these animals exhibited a significant inflammatory response and had impaired vessel function.

The researchers explained that the experimental data showed aircraft noise alone triggers a proinflammatory transcription program that promotes the infiltration of immune cells into cardiovascular tissue in animals with acute myocardial infarction. They noted an increased infiltration of CD45+ cells into the vessels and heart, dominated by neutrophils in vessel tissue and Ly6Chigh monocytes in heart tissue. This infiltration creates a proinflammatory milieu that adversely affects the outcome after myocardial infarction by predisposing the heart tissue to greater ischemic damage and functional impairment. Exposure of animals to aircraft noise before induction of myocardial infarction by left anterior descending (LAD) coronary artery ligation impaired left ventricular function and increased infarct size after cardiac ischemia. In addition, noise exposure exacerbated infarct-induced endothelial dysfunction of peripheral vessels as early as 24 hours after LAD ligation.

Clinical Confirmation

These experimental results were confirmed by observations in the population-based Gutenberg Health Study. The researchers analyzed data from 100 patients with heart attack. The lead and senior authors of the study Michael Molitor, MD, and Philip Wenzel, MD, of the University of Mainz, explained, “From our studies, we have learned that exposure to aircraft noise before a heart attack significantly amplifies subsequent cardiovascular inflammation and exacerbates ischemic heart failure, which is favored by inflammation-promoting vascular conditioning. Our translational results show that people who have been exposed to noise in the past have a worse course if they experience a heart attack later in life.”

Study participants who had experienced a heart attack in their medical history had elevated levels of C-reactive protein if they had been exposed to aircraft noise in the past and subsequently developed noise annoyance reactions (0.305 vs 1.5; P = .0094). In addition, left ventricular ejection fraction in these patients after a heart attack was worse than that in patients with infarction without noise exposure in their medical history (62.5 vs 65.6; P = .0053).

The results suggest that measures to reduce environmental noise could help improve the clinical outcomes of heart attack patients, according to the authors.

Mental Health Effects

Traffic noise also may be associated with an increased risk for depression and anxiety disorders, as reported 2 years ago by the German Society for Psychosomatic Medicine and Medical Psychotherapy. Evolution has programmed the human organism to perceive noises as indicators of potential sources of danger — even during sleep. “Noise puts the body on alert,” explained Manfred E. Beutel, MD, director of the Clinic for Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy at the University of Mainz. As a result, the autonomic nervous system activates stress hormones such as adrenaline and cortisol, leading to an increase in heart rate and blood pressure. If noise becomes chronic, chronic diseases can develop. “Indeed, observational and experimental studies have shown that persistent noise annoyance promotes incident hypertension, cardiovascular diseases, and type 2 diabetes,” said Dr. Beutel.

Depression Risk Doubled

Among the negative effects of noise annoyance are also mental illnesses, as has become increasingly clear. “Noise annoyance disrupts daily activities and interferes with feelings and thoughts, sleep, and recovery,” said Dr. Beutel. The interruptions trigger negative emotional reactions such as anger, distress, exhaustion, flight impulses, and stress symptoms. “Such conditions promote the development of depression over time,” said Dr. Beutel. This observation was confirmed by the large-scale Gutenberg Health Study using the example of the Mainz population, which suffers to a large extent from noise annoyance because of the nearby Frankfurt Airport. “With increasing noise annoyance, the rates of depression and anxiety disorders steadily increased, until the risks eventually doubled with extreme annoyance,” said Dr. Beutel. Other studies point in the same direction. For example, a meta-analysis found a 12% increase in the risk for depression per 10-dB increase in noise. Another study found an association between nocturnal noise annoyance and the use of antidepressants.

Fine Particulate Matter

According to an evaluation of the Gutenberg Study, people perceive noise annoyance from aircraft noise as the most pronounced, followed by road, neighborhood, industrial, and railway noise. Noise occurs most frequently in urban areas that also produce air pollution such as fine particulate matter. “Fine particulate matter is also suspected of promoting anxiety and depression,” said Dr. Beutel, “because the small particles of fine particulate matter can enter the bloodstream and trigger inflammatory processes there, which in turn are closely related to depression.”

This story was translated from Univadis Germany, which is part of the Medscape professional network, using several editorial tools, including AI, as part of the process. Human editors reviewed this content before publication. A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

New research by Thomas Münzel, MD, senior professor of cardiology at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz in Mainz, Germany, and colleagues again emphasized the harmful effects of noise on the heart and blood vessels. An analysis of current epidemiologic data provided strong indications that transportation noise is closely related to cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, according to a statement on the data analysis. The results were published in Circulation Research.

Morbidity and Mortality

Epidemiologic studies have shown that road, rail, or air traffic noise increases the risk for cardiovascular morbidity and mortality, with strong evidence for ischemic heart disease, heart failure, and stroke, according to the scientists. The World Health Organization reported that at least 1.6 million healthy life years are lost annually in Western Europe because of traffic-related noise. Nighttime traffic noise leads to sleep fragmentation and shortening, an increase in stress hormone levels, and increased oxidative stress in the vessels and brain. These factors could favor vascular (endothelial) dysfunction, inflammation, and hypertension, thereby increasing cardiovascular risk.

Consequences and Pathomechanisms

In the current publication, the authors provided an overview of epidemiologic research on the effects of transportation noise on cardiovascular risk factors and diseases, discussed mechanistic insights from the latest clinical and experimental studies, and proposed new risk markers to address noise-induced cardiovascular effects in the general population. An integrated analysis in the article demonstrated that for every 10 dB(A) increase, the risk for cardiovascular diseases such as heart attack, stroke, and heart failure significantly increases by 3.2%.

The authors also explained the possible effects of noise on changes in gene networks, epigenetic pathways, circadian rhythms, signal transmission along the neuronal-cardiovascular axis, oxidative stress, inflammation, and metabolism. Finally, current and future noise protection strategies are described, and the existing evidence on noise as a cardiovascular risk factor is discussed.

Confirmed Cardiovascular Risk Factor

“As an increasing proportion of the population is exposed to harmful traffic noise, efforts to reduce noise and laws for noise reduction are of great importance for future public health,” said Dr. Münzel. “It is also important for us that due to the strong evidence, traffic noise is finally recognized as a risk factor for cardiovascular diseases.”

Heart Attack Outcomes

Dr. Münzel and other researchers from Mainz have been studying the cardiovascular consequences of air pollution and traffic noise for several years. For example, they found that heart attacks in people and animals exposed to high noise levels earlier in life healed poorly. These results were published last year in Cardiovascular Research. According to the authors, the findings suggest that traffic noise may play a significant role in the development and course of coronary heart disease, such as after a heart attack.

The scientists initially found in animal experiments that exposure to aircraft noise for 4 days led to increased inflammation in the vessels. Compared with mice not exposed to aircraft noise, the noise-exposed animals showed an increase in free radicals; these animals exhibited a significant inflammatory response and had impaired vessel function.

The researchers explained that the experimental data showed aircraft noise alone triggers a proinflammatory transcription program that promotes the infiltration of immune cells into cardiovascular tissue in animals with acute myocardial infarction. They noted an increased infiltration of CD45+ cells into the vessels and heart, dominated by neutrophils in vessel tissue and Ly6Chigh monocytes in heart tissue. This infiltration creates a proinflammatory milieu that adversely affects the outcome after myocardial infarction by predisposing the heart tissue to greater ischemic damage and functional impairment. Exposure of animals to aircraft noise before induction of myocardial infarction by left anterior descending (LAD) coronary artery ligation impaired left ventricular function and increased infarct size after cardiac ischemia. In addition, noise exposure exacerbated infarct-induced endothelial dysfunction of peripheral vessels as early as 24 hours after LAD ligation.

Clinical Confirmation

These experimental results were confirmed by observations in the population-based Gutenberg Health Study. The researchers analyzed data from 100 patients with heart attack. The lead and senior authors of the study Michael Molitor, MD, and Philip Wenzel, MD, of the University of Mainz, explained, “From our studies, we have learned that exposure to aircraft noise before a heart attack significantly amplifies subsequent cardiovascular inflammation and exacerbates ischemic heart failure, which is favored by inflammation-promoting vascular conditioning. Our translational results show that people who have been exposed to noise in the past have a worse course if they experience a heart attack later in life.”

Study participants who had experienced a heart attack in their medical history had elevated levels of C-reactive protein if they had been exposed to aircraft noise in the past and subsequently developed noise annoyance reactions (0.305 vs 1.5; P = .0094). In addition, left ventricular ejection fraction in these patients after a heart attack was worse than that in patients with infarction without noise exposure in their medical history (62.5 vs 65.6; P = .0053).

The results suggest that measures to reduce environmental noise could help improve the clinical outcomes of heart attack patients, according to the authors.

Mental Health Effects

Traffic noise also may be associated with an increased risk for depression and anxiety disorders, as reported 2 years ago by the German Society for Psychosomatic Medicine and Medical Psychotherapy. Evolution has programmed the human organism to perceive noises as indicators of potential sources of danger — even during sleep. “Noise puts the body on alert,” explained Manfred E. Beutel, MD, director of the Clinic for Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy at the University of Mainz. As a result, the autonomic nervous system activates stress hormones such as adrenaline and cortisol, leading to an increase in heart rate and blood pressure. If noise becomes chronic, chronic diseases can develop. “Indeed, observational and experimental studies have shown that persistent noise annoyance promotes incident hypertension, cardiovascular diseases, and type 2 diabetes,” said Dr. Beutel.

Depression Risk Doubled

Among the negative effects of noise annoyance are also mental illnesses, as has become increasingly clear. “Noise annoyance disrupts daily activities and interferes with feelings and thoughts, sleep, and recovery,” said Dr. Beutel. The interruptions trigger negative emotional reactions such as anger, distress, exhaustion, flight impulses, and stress symptoms. “Such conditions promote the development of depression over time,” said Dr. Beutel. This observation was confirmed by the large-scale Gutenberg Health Study using the example of the Mainz population, which suffers to a large extent from noise annoyance because of the nearby Frankfurt Airport. “With increasing noise annoyance, the rates of depression and anxiety disorders steadily increased, until the risks eventually doubled with extreme annoyance,” said Dr. Beutel. Other studies point in the same direction. For example, a meta-analysis found a 12% increase in the risk for depression per 10-dB increase in noise. Another study found an association between nocturnal noise annoyance and the use of antidepressants.

Fine Particulate Matter

According to an evaluation of the Gutenberg Study, people perceive noise annoyance from aircraft noise as the most pronounced, followed by road, neighborhood, industrial, and railway noise. Noise occurs most frequently in urban areas that also produce air pollution such as fine particulate matter. “Fine particulate matter is also suspected of promoting anxiety and depression,” said Dr. Beutel, “because the small particles of fine particulate matter can enter the bloodstream and trigger inflammatory processes there, which in turn are closely related to depression.”

This story was translated from Univadis Germany, which is part of the Medscape professional network, using several editorial tools, including AI, as part of the process. Human editors reviewed this content before publication. A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

DENVER — Among patients with major depressive disorder, transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) had similar efficacy to electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), according to results from a retrospective study of patients treated in the past 20 years.

“We always learn in our textbooks that after about two or three medication trials is when you can start exploring more serious treatment protocols, such as ECT or TMS, but a lot of these patients weren’t going forward with it, and I was curious about it. I figured that TMS, which is a less expensive, less scary procedure that patients would more likely be open to, that is also approved for treatment resistant depression, would be a good alternative to ECT,” said Anuttham Kandhadai, a third-year medical student at University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, who presented the study at the 2024 annual meeting of the American Academy of Neurology.
 

Study Findings Lead to More Questions

The researchers found lower rates of depressive episodes, suicidal attempts, and suicidal ideation among patients treated with TMS, but an important limitation was that the researchers did not know the severity of the depression in the two patient groups, according to Branch Coslett, MD, who attended the session and has performed research with TMS to treat aphasia in stroke patients. “I think it’s a very interesting study, and certainly something worth pursuing, but given that ECT is only used as a last resort, whereas TMS is often used as a second-line therapy, I think you’re really talking about very different populations that have had these treatments,” said Dr. Coslett.

Mr. Kandhadai recognized the limitations of the study and looks forward to expanding the research. “I’d love to explore cost effectiveness of the treatments. I’d love to explore patient familiarity and patient comfort with different treatments. And I’d also love to explore a more controlled study that can determine how severe someone’s depression is, and then be able to control for that and explore the outcomes based on the treatment protocol,” he said.

The ideal comparative study would be prospective, “but that will never be done. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and similar sources of information have really poisoned the well,” said Dr. Coslett. However, he noted that advances have been made in ECT, and that targeting the right hemisphere produces fewer side effects: “The outcomes from unilateral right hemisphere stimulation are said to be every bit as good or maybe better, and you don’t get the confusion, you don’t get the memory loss, you don’t get all that sort of stuff that you’d expect when somebody has a prolonged, generalized tonic-clonic seizure.”

Still, people are naturally reluctant to undergo ECT. “I’ve seen it. It’s pretty barbaric. It’s better now and at my institution, people do get it, but they really, really have to be intractable,” he said.
 

Comparing Treatment Options

Mr. Kandhadai and his co-authors used the TriNetX database to identify patients with treatment-resistant major depressive disorder who received TMS or ECT in the past 20 years. There were 2,916 patients in both cohorts, who were matched by age, sex, ethnicity, mood and behavioral disorders, endocrine disorders, intellectual disabilities, cerebrovascular disease, and other nervous system disorders. The mean age at treatment was 48.2 years, 38.5% were male, and 3.1% were Black or African American.

Short-term outcomes favored TMS, including the frequency of disorientation (0.41% vs 2.81%), retrograde amnesia (0.34% vs 0.65%), and headache (4.36% vs 7.20%). Long-term outcomes from 1 month to 5 years post treatment were also better in the TMS group, including depressive episodes (44.99% vs 53.77%), suicide attempts (3.98% vs 6.86%), and suicidal ideation (12.38% vs 23.49%). Kaplan-Meier curve analysis between 1 month and 5 years showed a benefit to TMS in probability of not experiencing a depressive episode, and not experiencing suicidal ideation.

“ECT has been the gold standard of treatment resistant depression for a long time, and it deserves to be. I think it’s something you should offer your patients. Not everyone might be comfortable with it, and if they’re not, I think it’s important to not stop the conversation there, but to offer something like TMS because TMS is something that might be more accessible to patients. It might be more affordable, and it might be less scary,” said Mr. Kandhadai

Mr. Kandhadai and Dr. Coslett have no relevant financial disclosures.

DENVER — Among patients with major depressive disorder, transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) had similar efficacy to electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), according to results from a retrospective study of patients treated in the past 20 years.

“We always learn in our textbooks that after about two or three medication trials is when you can start exploring more serious treatment protocols, such as ECT or TMS, but a lot of these patients weren’t going forward with it, and I was curious about it. I figured that TMS, which is a less expensive, less scary procedure that patients would more likely be open to, that is also approved for treatment resistant depression, would be a good alternative to ECT,” said Anuttham Kandhadai, a third-year medical student at University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, who presented the study at the 2024 annual meeting of the American Academy of Neurology.
 

Study Findings Lead to More Questions

The researchers found lower rates of depressive episodes, suicidal attempts, and suicidal ideation among patients treated with TMS, but an important limitation was that the researchers did not know the severity of the depression in the two patient groups, according to Branch Coslett, MD, who attended the session and has performed research with TMS to treat aphasia in stroke patients. “I think it’s a very interesting study, and certainly something worth pursuing, but given that ECT is only used as a last resort, whereas TMS is often used as a second-line therapy, I think you’re really talking about very different populations that have had these treatments,” said Dr. Coslett.

Mr. Kandhadai recognized the limitations of the study and looks forward to expanding the research. “I’d love to explore cost effectiveness of the treatments. I’d love to explore patient familiarity and patient comfort with different treatments. And I’d also love to explore a more controlled study that can determine how severe someone’s depression is, and then be able to control for that and explore the outcomes based on the treatment protocol,” he said.

The ideal comparative study would be prospective, “but that will never be done. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and similar sources of information have really poisoned the well,” said Dr. Coslett. However, he noted that advances have been made in ECT, and that targeting the right hemisphere produces fewer side effects: “The outcomes from unilateral right hemisphere stimulation are said to be every bit as good or maybe better, and you don’t get the confusion, you don’t get the memory loss, you don’t get all that sort of stuff that you’d expect when somebody has a prolonged, generalized tonic-clonic seizure.”

Still, people are naturally reluctant to undergo ECT. “I’ve seen it. It’s pretty barbaric. It’s better now and at my institution, people do get it, but they really, really have to be intractable,” he said.
 

Comparing Treatment Options

Mr. Kandhadai and his co-authors used the TriNetX database to identify patients with treatment-resistant major depressive disorder who received TMS or ECT in the past 20 years. There were 2,916 patients in both cohorts, who were matched by age, sex, ethnicity, mood and behavioral disorders, endocrine disorders, intellectual disabilities, cerebrovascular disease, and other nervous system disorders. The mean age at treatment was 48.2 years, 38.5% were male, and 3.1% were Black or African American.

Short-term outcomes favored TMS, including the frequency of disorientation (0.41% vs 2.81%), retrograde amnesia (0.34% vs 0.65%), and headache (4.36% vs 7.20%). Long-term outcomes from 1 month to 5 years post treatment were also better in the TMS group, including depressive episodes (44.99% vs 53.77%), suicide attempts (3.98% vs 6.86%), and suicidal ideation (12.38% vs 23.49%). Kaplan-Meier curve analysis between 1 month and 5 years showed a benefit to TMS in probability of not experiencing a depressive episode, and not experiencing suicidal ideation.

“ECT has been the gold standard of treatment resistant depression for a long time, and it deserves to be. I think it’s something you should offer your patients. Not everyone might be comfortable with it, and if they’re not, I think it’s important to not stop the conversation there, but to offer something like TMS because TMS is something that might be more accessible to patients. It might be more affordable, and it might be less scary,” said Mr. Kandhadai

Mr. Kandhadai and Dr. Coslett have no relevant financial disclosures.

DENVER — Among patients with major depressive disorder, transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) had similar efficacy to electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), according to results from a retrospective study of patients treated in the past 20 years.

“We always learn in our textbooks that after about two or three medication trials is when you can start exploring more serious treatment protocols, such as ECT or TMS, but a lot of these patients weren’t going forward with it, and I was curious about it. I figured that TMS, which is a less expensive, less scary procedure that patients would more likely be open to, that is also approved for treatment resistant depression, would be a good alternative to ECT,” said Anuttham Kandhadai, a third-year medical student at University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, who presented the study at the 2024 annual meeting of the American Academy of Neurology.
 

Study Findings Lead to More Questions

The researchers found lower rates of depressive episodes, suicidal attempts, and suicidal ideation among patients treated with TMS, but an important limitation was that the researchers did not know the severity of the depression in the two patient groups, according to Branch Coslett, MD, who attended the session and has performed research with TMS to treat aphasia in stroke patients. “I think it’s a very interesting study, and certainly something worth pursuing, but given that ECT is only used as a last resort, whereas TMS is often used as a second-line therapy, I think you’re really talking about very different populations that have had these treatments,” said Dr. Coslett.

Mr. Kandhadai recognized the limitations of the study and looks forward to expanding the research. “I’d love to explore cost effectiveness of the treatments. I’d love to explore patient familiarity and patient comfort with different treatments. And I’d also love to explore a more controlled study that can determine how severe someone’s depression is, and then be able to control for that and explore the outcomes based on the treatment protocol,” he said.

The ideal comparative study would be prospective, “but that will never be done. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and similar sources of information have really poisoned the well,” said Dr. Coslett. However, he noted that advances have been made in ECT, and that targeting the right hemisphere produces fewer side effects: “The outcomes from unilateral right hemisphere stimulation are said to be every bit as good or maybe better, and you don’t get the confusion, you don’t get the memory loss, you don’t get all that sort of stuff that you’d expect when somebody has a prolonged, generalized tonic-clonic seizure.”

Still, people are naturally reluctant to undergo ECT. “I’ve seen it. It’s pretty barbaric. It’s better now and at my institution, people do get it, but they really, really have to be intractable,” he said.
 

Comparing Treatment Options

Mr. Kandhadai and his co-authors used the TriNetX database to identify patients with treatment-resistant major depressive disorder who received TMS or ECT in the past 20 years. There were 2,916 patients in both cohorts, who were matched by age, sex, ethnicity, mood and behavioral disorders, endocrine disorders, intellectual disabilities, cerebrovascular disease, and other nervous system disorders. The mean age at treatment was 48.2 years, 38.5% were male, and 3.1% were Black or African American.

Short-term outcomes favored TMS, including the frequency of disorientation (0.41% vs 2.81%), retrograde amnesia (0.34% vs 0.65%), and headache (4.36% vs 7.20%). Long-term outcomes from 1 month to 5 years post treatment were also better in the TMS group, including depressive episodes (44.99% vs 53.77%), suicide attempts (3.98% vs 6.86%), and suicidal ideation (12.38% vs 23.49%). Kaplan-Meier curve analysis between 1 month and 5 years showed a benefit to TMS in probability of not experiencing a depressive episode, and not experiencing suicidal ideation.

“ECT has been the gold standard of treatment resistant depression for a long time, and it deserves to be. I think it’s something you should offer your patients. Not everyone might be comfortable with it, and if they’re not, I think it’s important to not stop the conversation there, but to offer something like TMS because TMS is something that might be more accessible to patients. It might be more affordable, and it might be less scary,” said Mr. Kandhadai

Mr. Kandhadai and Dr. Coslett have no relevant financial disclosures.

Alerting neurologists via telemedicine that a patient with suspected acute stroke is en route to the hospital significantly enhances the speed at which thrombolysis is administered and increases the number of patients who receive timelier, potentially lifesaving treatment, new research showed.

“This preliminary evidence supports adopting teleneurology prenotification as a best practice within health systems that have telestroke capabilities,” said study investigator Mark McDonald, MD, a neurologist at TeleSpecialists, Fort Myers, Florida.

The findings were presented at the 2024 annual meeting of the American Academy of Neurology.
 

Best Practices

The impact of emergency medical services prenotification, which refers to paramedics alerting receiving hospital emergency departments (EDs) of a suspected stroke on the way for appropriate preparations to be made, is well-defined, said Dr. McDonald.

“What we’re proposing as a best practice is not only should the ED or ED provider be aware, but there needs to be a system in place for standardizing communication to the neurology team so they’re aware, too.”

Prenotification allows a neurologist to “get on the screen to begin coordinating with the ED team to adequately prepare for the possibility of thrombolytic treatment,” he added.

Currently, teleneurology prenotification, he said, is variable and its benefits unclear.

Dr. McDonald said “his organization, TeleSpecialists, maintains a large detailed medical records database for emergency-related, teleneurology, and other cases. For stroke, it recommends 15 best practices” for facilities including prenotification of teleneurology.

Other best practices include evaluating and administering thrombolysis in the CT imaging suite, a preassembled stroke kit that includes antihypertensives and thrombolytic agents, ensuring a weigh bed is available to determine the exact dose of thrombolysis treatment, and implementing “mock” stroke alerts, said Dr. McDonald.

From the database, researchers extracted acute telestroke consultations seen in the ED in 103 facilities in 15 states. Facilities that did not adhere to the 14 best practices other than teleneurologist prenotification were excluded from the analysis.

Of 9290 patients included in the study, 731 were treated with thrombolysis at prenotification facilities (median age, 69 years; median National Institutes of Health Stroke Score [NIHSS], 8) and 31 were treated at facilities without prenotification (median age, 63 years; median NIHSS score, 4). The thrombolytic treatment rate was 8.5% at prenotification facilities versus 4.8% at facilities without prenotification — a difference that was statistically significant.

Prenotification facilities had a significantly shorter median door-to-needle (DTN) time than those without such a process at 35 versus 43 minutes. In addition, there was a statistically significant difference in the percentage of patients with times less than 60 minutes at approximately 88% at prenotification facilities versus about 68% at the facilities without prenotification.
 

Case-Level Analysis

However, just because a facility adheres to teleneurology prenotification as a whole, doesn’t mean it occurs in every case. Researchers explored the impact of teleneurology prenotification at the case level rather than the facility level.

“That gave us a bit more insight into the real impact because it’s not just being at a facility with the best practice; it’s actually working case by case to see whether it happened or not and that’s where we get the most compelling findings,” said Dr. McDonald.

Of 761 treatment cases, there was prenotification to the neurology team in 401 cases. In 360 cases, prenotification did not occur.

The median DTN time was 29 minutes in the group with actual prenotification vs 41.5 minutes in the group without actual prenotification, a difference that was statistically significant, Dr. McDonald said.

As for treatment within 30 minutes of arrival, 50.4% of patients in the teleneurology prenotification group versus 18.9% in the no prenotification group — a statistically significant difference.

DTN time of less than 30 minutes is increasingly used as a target. “Being treated within this time frame improves outcomes and reduces length of hospital stay,” said Dr. McDonald.

The prenotification group also had a statistically significant higher percentage of treatment within 60 minutes of hospital arrival (93.5% vs 80%).

These new findings should help convince health and telestroke systems that teleneurology prenotification is worth implementing. “We want to achieve consensus on this as a best practice,” said Dr. McDonald.

Prenotification, he added, “coordinates the process and eliminates unnecessary and time-consuming steps.”

Dr. McDonald plans to prospectively study prenotification by collecting data on a facility before and after implementing a prenotification process.
 

Compelling Evidence

Commenting on the research, David L. Tirschwell, MD, Harborview Medical Center, Department of Neurology, Seattle, who cochaired the AAN session featuring the research, said the study provides compelling evidence that teleneurologist prenotification improves DTN time.

“Prenotifications are often standard of care in many healthcare settings and should likely be considered a best practice. When possible, extending such prenotification to a teleconsultant would make sense, and these preliminary data support that approach.”

However, more details are needed “to consider whether the intervention is possibly generalizable to other telestroke practices across the United States,” said Dr. Tirschwell.

Dr. McDonald reported receiving personal compensation for serving as a consultant for Syntrillo Inc. and has stock in Syntrillo Inc. Dr. Tirschwell reported no relevant conflicts of interest.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

Alerting neurologists via telemedicine that a patient with suspected acute stroke is en route to the hospital significantly enhances the speed at which thrombolysis is administered and increases the number of patients who receive timelier, potentially lifesaving treatment, new research showed.

“This preliminary evidence supports adopting teleneurology prenotification as a best practice within health systems that have telestroke capabilities,” said study investigator Mark McDonald, MD, a neurologist at TeleSpecialists, Fort Myers, Florida.

The findings were presented at the 2024 annual meeting of the American Academy of Neurology.
 

Best Practices

The impact of emergency medical services prenotification, which refers to paramedics alerting receiving hospital emergency departments (EDs) of a suspected stroke on the way for appropriate preparations to be made, is well-defined, said Dr. McDonald.

“What we’re proposing as a best practice is not only should the ED or ED provider be aware, but there needs to be a system in place for standardizing communication to the neurology team so they’re aware, too.”

Prenotification allows a neurologist to “get on the screen to begin coordinating with the ED team to adequately prepare for the possibility of thrombolytic treatment,” he added.

Currently, teleneurology prenotification, he said, is variable and its benefits unclear.

Dr. McDonald said “his organization, TeleSpecialists, maintains a large detailed medical records database for emergency-related, teleneurology, and other cases. For stroke, it recommends 15 best practices” for facilities including prenotification of teleneurology.

Other best practices include evaluating and administering thrombolysis in the CT imaging suite, a preassembled stroke kit that includes antihypertensives and thrombolytic agents, ensuring a weigh bed is available to determine the exact dose of thrombolysis treatment, and implementing “mock” stroke alerts, said Dr. McDonald.

From the database, researchers extracted acute telestroke consultations seen in the ED in 103 facilities in 15 states. Facilities that did not adhere to the 14 best practices other than teleneurologist prenotification were excluded from the analysis.

Of 9290 patients included in the study, 731 were treated with thrombolysis at prenotification facilities (median age, 69 years; median National Institutes of Health Stroke Score [NIHSS], 8) and 31 were treated at facilities without prenotification (median age, 63 years; median NIHSS score, 4). The thrombolytic treatment rate was 8.5% at prenotification facilities versus 4.8% at facilities without prenotification — a difference that was statistically significant.

Prenotification facilities had a significantly shorter median door-to-needle (DTN) time than those without such a process at 35 versus 43 minutes. In addition, there was a statistically significant difference in the percentage of patients with times less than 60 minutes at approximately 88% at prenotification facilities versus about 68% at the facilities without prenotification.
 

Case-Level Analysis

However, just because a facility adheres to teleneurology prenotification as a whole, doesn’t mean it occurs in every case. Researchers explored the impact of teleneurology prenotification at the case level rather than the facility level.

“That gave us a bit more insight into the real impact because it’s not just being at a facility with the best practice; it’s actually working case by case to see whether it happened or not and that’s where we get the most compelling findings,” said Dr. McDonald.

Of 761 treatment cases, there was prenotification to the neurology team in 401 cases. In 360 cases, prenotification did not occur.

The median DTN time was 29 minutes in the group with actual prenotification vs 41.5 minutes in the group without actual prenotification, a difference that was statistically significant, Dr. McDonald said.

As for treatment within 30 minutes of arrival, 50.4% of patients in the teleneurology prenotification group versus 18.9% in the no prenotification group — a statistically significant difference.

DTN time of less than 30 minutes is increasingly used as a target. “Being treated within this time frame improves outcomes and reduces length of hospital stay,” said Dr. McDonald.

The prenotification group also had a statistically significant higher percentage of treatment within 60 minutes of hospital arrival (93.5% vs 80%).

These new findings should help convince health and telestroke systems that teleneurology prenotification is worth implementing. “We want to achieve consensus on this as a best practice,” said Dr. McDonald.

Prenotification, he added, “coordinates the process and eliminates unnecessary and time-consuming steps.”

Dr. McDonald plans to prospectively study prenotification by collecting data on a facility before and after implementing a prenotification process.
 

Compelling Evidence

Commenting on the research, David L. Tirschwell, MD, Harborview Medical Center, Department of Neurology, Seattle, who cochaired the AAN session featuring the research, said the study provides compelling evidence that teleneurologist prenotification improves DTN time.

“Prenotifications are often standard of care in many healthcare settings and should likely be considered a best practice. When possible, extending such prenotification to a teleconsultant would make sense, and these preliminary data support that approach.”

However, more details are needed “to consider whether the intervention is possibly generalizable to other telestroke practices across the United States,” said Dr. Tirschwell.

Dr. McDonald reported receiving personal compensation for serving as a consultant for Syntrillo Inc. and has stock in Syntrillo Inc. Dr. Tirschwell reported no relevant conflicts of interest.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.

Alerting neurologists via telemedicine that a patient with suspected acute stroke is en route to the hospital significantly enhances the speed at which thrombolysis is administered and increases the number of patients who receive timelier, potentially lifesaving treatment, new research showed.

“This preliminary evidence supports adopting teleneurology prenotification as a best practice within health systems that have telestroke capabilities,” said study investigator Mark McDonald, MD, a neurologist at TeleSpecialists, Fort Myers, Florida.

The findings were presented at the 2024 annual meeting of the American Academy of Neurology.
 

Best Practices

The impact of emergency medical services prenotification, which refers to paramedics alerting receiving hospital emergency departments (EDs) of a suspected stroke on the way for appropriate preparations to be made, is well-defined, said Dr. McDonald.

“What we’re proposing as a best practice is not only should the ED or ED provider be aware, but there needs to be a system in place for standardizing communication to the neurology team so they’re aware, too.”

Prenotification allows a neurologist to “get on the screen to begin coordinating with the ED team to adequately prepare for the possibility of thrombolytic treatment,” he added.

Currently, teleneurology prenotification, he said, is variable and its benefits unclear.

Dr. McDonald said “his organization, TeleSpecialists, maintains a large detailed medical records database for emergency-related, teleneurology, and other cases. For stroke, it recommends 15 best practices” for facilities including prenotification of teleneurology.

Other best practices include evaluating and administering thrombolysis in the CT imaging suite, a preassembled stroke kit that includes antihypertensives and thrombolytic agents, ensuring a weigh bed is available to determine the exact dose of thrombolysis treatment, and implementing “mock” stroke alerts, said Dr. McDonald.

From the database, researchers extracted acute telestroke consultations seen in the ED in 103 facilities in 15 states. Facilities that did not adhere to the 14 best practices other than teleneurologist prenotification were excluded from the analysis.

Of 9290 patients included in the study, 731 were treated with thrombolysis at prenotification facilities (median age, 69 years; median National Institutes of Health Stroke Score [NIHSS], 8) and 31 were treated at facilities without prenotification (median age, 63 years; median NIHSS score, 4). The thrombolytic treatment rate was 8.5% at prenotification facilities versus 4.8% at facilities without prenotification — a difference that was statistically significant.

Prenotification facilities had a significantly shorter median door-to-needle (DTN) time than those without such a process at 35 versus 43 minutes. In addition, there was a statistically significant difference in the percentage of patients with times less than 60 minutes at approximately 88% at prenotification facilities versus about 68% at the facilities without prenotification.
 

Case-Level Analysis

However, just because a facility adheres to teleneurology prenotification as a whole, doesn’t mean it occurs in every case. Researchers explored the impact of teleneurology prenotification at the case level rather than the facility level.

“That gave us a bit more insight into the real impact because it’s not just being at a facility with the best practice; it’s actually working case by case to see whether it happened or not and that’s where we get the most compelling findings,” said Dr. McDonald.

Of 761 treatment cases, there was prenotification to the neurology team in 401 cases. In 360 cases, prenotification did not occur.

The median DTN time was 29 minutes in the group with actual prenotification vs 41.5 minutes in the group without actual prenotification, a difference that was statistically significant, Dr. McDonald said.

As for treatment within 30 minutes of arrival, 50.4% of patients in the teleneurology prenotification group versus 18.9% in the no prenotification group — a statistically significant difference.

DTN time of less than 30 minutes is increasingly used as a target. “Being treated within this time frame improves outcomes and reduces length of hospital stay,” said Dr. McDonald.

The prenotification group also had a statistically significant higher percentage of treatment within 60 minutes of hospital arrival (93.5% vs 80%).

These new findings should help convince health and telestroke systems that teleneurology prenotification is worth implementing. “We want to achieve consensus on this as a best practice,” said Dr. McDonald.

Prenotification, he added, “coordinates the process and eliminates unnecessary and time-consuming steps.”

Dr. McDonald plans to prospectively study prenotification by collecting data on a facility before and after implementing a prenotification process.
 

Compelling Evidence

Commenting on the research, David L. Tirschwell, MD, Harborview Medical Center, Department of Neurology, Seattle, who cochaired the AAN session featuring the research, said the study provides compelling evidence that teleneurologist prenotification improves DTN time.

“Prenotifications are often standard of care in many healthcare settings and should likely be considered a best practice. When possible, extending such prenotification to a teleconsultant would make sense, and these preliminary data support that approach.”

However, more details are needed “to consider whether the intervention is possibly generalizable to other telestroke practices across the United States,” said Dr. Tirschwell.

Dr. McDonald reported receiving personal compensation for serving as a consultant for Syntrillo Inc. and has stock in Syntrillo Inc. Dr. Tirschwell reported no relevant conflicts of interest.

A version of this article appeared on Medscape.com.