Leading-edge Technology to Provide Rapid Stroke Treatment
Loyola Medicine offers the latest technology for stroke care with our telemedicine stroke program, which is a significant advance in stroke treatment. Through this unique service, Loyola stroke specialists can consult with other doctors over the internet and talk directly with a patient or a patient’s family.
This technology allows Loyola’s doctors to offer their expert medical care and specialty advice to patients anywhere, anytime – and can greatly reduce your risk of further damage due to stroke.
Telemedicine uses information technology to exchange medical data, images and sound. It allows doctors, hospitals and other clinicians to deliver consultations, procedures, examinations, test results and monitoring services to patients who are in another hospital or even in another city.
These telepresence tools, which include Loyola’s two stroke robots, use a microphone, monitor and a full-color, high-definition camera. Test results and images such as CT scans (computed tomography) are transmitted through a secure internet connection.
Our doctors in neurology, neurosurgery and pediatrics have years of experience with telemedicine technologies and are national leaders in their fields. These tools provide access to academic medical care with reduced wait times and travel – 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Why Choose Loyola for Stroke Treatment?
Loyola Medicine is the Midwest leader in telemedicine care and one of few hospitals nationwide to provide specialized stroke care 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Our program was created by nationally recognized experts in telemedicine—doctors with years of experience in direct bedside applications of telemedicine technology.
Loyola’s Stroke Center is composed of a nationally recognized team of experts in nearly every facet of stroke-related care, including emergency medicine, neurology, neurosurgery, neuropsychology, neuroradiology, stroke rehabilitative services, social work, nutrition, pharmacy and specialty nursing.
Loyola’s Stroke Center has been accredited by The Joint Commission as a comprehensive stroke center. The center has been recognized by the American Stroke Association with its Get with the Guidelines® – Stroke Gold Plus Quality Achievement Award for our commitment and success in implementing a higher standard of stroke care.
Our dedicated clinical neurosciences inpatient facility is a 40-bed unit in which multidisciplinary treatments, techniques and therapies are combined to provide stroke patients with the best possible outcome. Loyola is the only academic medical center in the Chicago area accredited as a stroke specialty program by CARF (Commission on Accreditation of Rehabilitation Facilities) International.
What to Expect with Telemedicine Tools for Stroke
Loyola Medicine is proud to partner with community hospitals to provide expert patient care with our advanced telemedicine program. Guided by strict technical standards and clinical practice guidelines, Loyola’s telemedicine program is a safe and cost-effective way to extend our academic-based medical care to your community.
Stroke telemedicine is a significant advance in stroke treatment. Working with your doctor to eliminate distance barriers and improve medical services that might not be consistently available in your local hospital, Loyola’s program offers you and your family access to a Loyola stroke specialist 24 hours a day.
When your doctor wants to consult with a Loyola doctor in order to give you the best care, a robot with a monitor and computer will be wheeled into your room. The doctor in your hospital will contact a Loyola doctor who will be at the telemedicine console at Loyola. The Loyola neurologist will ask you questions through the monitor.
Your Loyola doctor may ask you to raise an arm or speak, if you are able to do so. Tests that have been carried out, such as blood lipid tests, ultrasound or CT scans (computed tomography), will be at the neurologist’s fingertips. With this information, the neurologist can advise what the next step should be, whether that is thrombolytic drugs or observation.
Expert interventions, when administered within the first few hours after a stroke, can significantly reduce your risk of further damage due to stroke and improve your quality of life. Telemedicine and the world-class Loyola Stroke Center provide expert, timely care.
You will have immediate access to the latest research and subspecialists who treat large volumes of patients. Loyola specialists become part of your team, interacting with emergency room doctors to guide sophisticated, rapid-response treatment.
