Tenecteplase vs. Alteplase For … Stroke Mimics?

Bless their little hearts.

It’s almost as though this is a submission fo the IgNobel Prize, rather than a serious scientific manuscript. “How well does a medicine work when the patient doesn’t have the disease?” is basically a joke, right?

Not in the magical world of stroke neurology, replete with its array of meretricious interventions.

This is a secondary analysis of NOR-TEST, a phase III trial comparing alteplase with tenecteplase. A few folks believe tenecteplase has superior fibrinolysis to alteplase, and therefore ought to be potentially favored in acute ischemic stroke. NOR-TEST, for what it’s worth, could not detect any statistically significant difference between the two.

What is notable in this trial, of course, is the 17% rate of stroke mimics. And, this is a Very Important publication comparing the safety of these two medications when given to patients inappropriately. And, of course, there is no difference. There were three cases of intracerebral hemorrhage and three cases of extracranial bleeding, none of whom – you know – died, but were clearly all unnecessary iatrogenic injury.

Some more interesting notes, at least, from their analysis of stroke mimics. The average NIHSS in this entire study was 4, with the IQR for mimics 2-6 and for acute ischemia 2-8. There’s no useful evidence to suggest thrombolysis is superior to placebo in this sort of mild stroke cohort, but, here we are. Absent this evidence, some neurologists make an argument based on the Get With the Guidelines-Stroke registry, observing many patients with mild stroke are ultimately unable to be discharged to home due to persistent disability. In the NOR-TEST cohort of mimics, however, only 79% were assessed to have mRS 0-1 at 3 months, while their treated stroke cohort achieved mRS 0-1 only 60% of the time.  It would seem the base rate of mimic- or mild-stroke disability is effectively as observed in the GWTG-Stroke registry, regardless of treatment.

In sum, these authors have basically provided us with an unwitting glimpse into how acute stroke treatment has gone utterly off the rails in Norway.  Now, I wonder if they’re related to the group trying to push tPA in less than 20 minutes ….

“Safety and predictors of stroke mimics in The Norwegian Tenecteplase Stroke Trial (NOR-TEST)”

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30019629

2 thoughts on “Tenecteplase vs. Alteplase For … Stroke Mimics?”

  1. Hilarious. There’s no question, that the best candidate for fibrinolysis is one with a stroke mimic — it’s tremendously effective, results in enormous billing, and rarely hurts anybody. In addition, some are likely to get unwittingly diagnosed with an aborted stroke and medicalized for the rest of their lives with a wide-variety of drugs, imaging, and follow-up specialty and primary care appointments. Viola! A multibillion dollar medical-industrial complex is hatched, replete funded patients to help sustain the livelihood of hospitals and neurologists. What a country!

    1. All too true! Everyone talks about the safety of tPA in stroke mimics, but rarely do studies report consistent mechanisms for reclassifying patients as such. There’s simply no incentive to go looking for alternative explanations, and, as you say, then the patient is stuck with the downstream costs and harms of misdiagnosis.

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