[Can telemedicine re-establish geographic equity in the treatment of acute stroke?].
BACKGROUND
In acute stroke patients, urgent expert neurologic evaluation and thrombolytic treatment within the first hours alter onset are the only proven effective therapeutic measures. Patients living far from large hospitals do not have access to these measures.


METHODS
Implementing a telemedicine system allows that patients with suspected acute stroke admitted to a community hospital could be urgently evaluated by a specialized vascular neurologist located in a Reference Stroke Center. This paper reviews the best care access geographic equity imbalances created after the approval of acute stroke treatments and the solutions offered by the new telecommunication technologies.


CONCLUSIONS
Telemedicine systems allow around the clock specialized urgent evaluation of those patients arriving to hospitals lacking a neurologist on call. This may lead to the use of thrombolytic treatments in community hospitals under the supervision of an expert physician, reducing time to treatment and the number of unnecessary patient transfers to referral Stroke Centers.
Ribó
M
M
Unidad Neurovascular, Servicio de Neurología, Hospital General Universitari Vall d'Hebron, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Barcelona, España. marcriboj@hotmail.com
Alvarez-Sabín
J
J
D006297:Health Services Accessibility; D006801:Humans; D013030:Spain; D020521:Stroke / Q000188:drug therapy*; D017216:Telemedicine / Q000458:organization & administration; D015912:Thrombolytic Therapy