A new sensor can identify within minutes patients who have suffered a stroke. Using a pinprick of blood, the test may also be able to show the severity of the stroke by measuring levels of a tell-tale compound in the blood.
Doctors hope the sensor, which is on trial at NHS hospitals, could save lives with its much quicker diagnosis. It may also be used one day to identify people at greater risk of stroke and help prevent them.
It is then treated with clot-busting drugs but to be effective, these must be given within four-and-a-half hours of a stroke starting.
Currently, there is no quick way to identify the problem; on the patient’s arrival at hospital, CT scans are carried out to check for signs of a bleed on the brain, along with a series of other tests, but this can be time-consuming.What’s more, one in three patients will actually be experiencing stroke ‘mimics’, conditions that have similar symptoms, including migraine, seizures and infectious disorders such as meningoencephalitis.
These are produced within minutes when cells are starved of oxygen and glucose, as occurs during a stroke.The sensor, developed at the University of Warwick and on trial at University Hospitals Coventry & Warwickshire NHS Trust, can detect changing purine levels by analysing a pinprick of blood taken from the patient. In a new trial involving nearly 400 stroke patients, blood samples will be taken at the time of admission to hospital to test for purine levels and doctors will look at whether the results correspond with the extent of the damage caused by the stroke.
‘This study is looking for purine levels in blood after a stroke and the outcome of this study will be very informative.
‘If proven clinically significant, purine levels may help in the diagnosis and management of acute stroke and differentiating this from stroke mimics.’