Racial Differences Seen in Receipt of Lifesaving Stroke Treatments

TUESDAY, Dec. 19, 2023 (HealthDay News) -- Black patients with acute ischemic stroke are significantly less likely to receive tissue plasminogen activator (tPA) and endovascular thrombectomy (EVT) than White patients, according to a study published online in the December issue of the Journal of Stroke & Cerebrovascular Diseases.

Delaney Metcalf, from the Medical College of Georgia and Augusta University/University of Georgia Medical Partnership in Athens, and Donglan Zhang, Ph.D., from NYU Grossman Long Island School of Medicine in Mineola, New York, examined racial and ethnic differences in receiving tPA and EVT as treatment for ischemic stroke. The analysis included 89,035 ischemic stroke patients identified from the 2019 National Inpatient Sample.

The researchers found that non-Hispanic Black patients had significantly lower odds of receiving tPA (adjusted odds ratio, 0.85) and EVT (adjusted odds ratio, 0.75) than non-Hispanic White patients. Overall, minority populations (non-Hispanic Black, Hispanic, Pacific Islander, Native American, and Asian) had significantly longer hospital length of stay after treatment with tPA or EVT. There were no significant differences between race/ethnicity and in-hospital mortality after tPA or EVT.

"This study calls for interventions to expand the utilization of tPA and EVT and advance quality of care post-tPA or EVT in order to improve stroke care for minority patients," the authors write.

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