TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Kaohsiung Municipal Siaogang Hospital said that low temperatures and temperature differences between morning and evening increase the prevalence of stroke.
It warned those who experience symptoms such as drooping eyes, mouth and limb weakness, slurred speech, and visual impairment to seek medical attention immediately, per CNA.
According to health ministry statistics, cerebrovascular disease ranks fourth out of the top 10 causes of death among citizens in Taiwan. Strokes are the largest category and can be divided into ischemic and hemorrhagic.
Ischemic stroke (blood vessel blockage) accounts for more than 80% of all strokes, while hemorrhagic stroke is caused by excessive bleeding. Ischemic stroke is primarily treated with thrombolytic agents (rt-PA) to open blood vessels after a stroke occurs or physically remove the blood clot, with both treatment methods time-constrained.
One elderly woman surnamed Pan (潘) in Kaohsiung could not move her left hand and foot after waking up and had slurred speech. Her family took her to the emergency room, where a CT scan diagnosed her with acute cerebral artery embolism.
The hospital said the woman required an intracranial artery thrombectomy. She survived and was transferred to a regional hospital for rehabilitation.
Kaohsiung Municipal Siaogang Hospital neurologist Lin Tzu-chao (林子超) said that patients with severe blockages in larger blood vessels may only see limited benefit from rt-PA injections. In this case, another treatment option is arterial thrombectomy.
The hospital said that in November 2023, the national health insurance extended coverage for arterial thrombectomy procedures from 8 hours after stroke to within 24 hours. Exploration of adjacent blood vessels can potentially find other hidden vascular lesions and vascular wall detachment, hemangioma, or arteriovenous malformation.
