By Caroline Neal
The Journal Times
RACINE, Wis. — Ascension All Saints Hospital on Friday recognized its medical staff and paramedics from the Racine Fire Department for their quick response treating Martin L. Walker Sr.
During the event, the Ascension Wisconsin Prehospital Team recognized first responders for their efforts.
“At the heart of this program is the challenge coin — a symbol of outstanding service and commitment,” said Dr. Joseph Humphrey, an emergency medicine doctor at Ascension. “Receiving a challenge coin is a significant honor, symbolizing excellence and an unwavering commitment to serving the community.”
On Feb. 17, paramedics brought Walker to the Emergency Department after recognizing stroke symptoms. Within 22 minutes of Walker’s arrival, All Saints medical staff diagnosed and administered tenecteplase or TNK, a drug that treats blood clots and strokes.
“Martin got here just before the timetable would expire to use the rescue medicine we call the clot buster,” Humphrey said. “He got here just in the nick of time. If he would have waited 30 minutes more, we wouldn’t have been able to give him the medicine.”
According to Humphrey, TNK only can be used within a few hours.
“But if you wait too long, we can’t use it because the risks go up,” he said.
For Dr. Pramit Bhasin, a neurohospitalist and director of the stroke program, this response was the result of a “well-orchestrated plan” that Ascension put into effect.
Humphrey said that Ascension’s stroke protocols are set up to allow paramedics who identify the symptoms to activate the alert ahead of time, which allows the medical team to prepare.
“They come about 10 feet in from the ambulance door, and we’re on them — nursing and doctors and staff. We’re right there,” Humphrey said. “We’ve sped things up real quickly.”
When Walker arrived, he couldn’t speak clearly and was paralyzed on his left side and in one of his eye muscles, causing his eyes to cross when he looked in a certain direction.
Quickly making assessments in stroke cases is important, Bhasin said, because “time is brain.”
“Unlike your other body tissues, brain tissue if it dies, it doesn’t regenerate,” Bhasin said. “So for us, that is an immediate crisis that we have to resolve very quickly for the patient.”
Indeed, Bhasin said that within two minutes of administration, he could see “the stroke symptoms resolving,” with Walker regaining movement in his left arm and leg.
His speech, which had been slurred, also improved over the next couple days.
“It was revolutionary the amount of function he got back” within 30 minutes of administering the drug, Humphrey said.
“Even though at the end, he had minor residual strokes that were very small, he had healed from them considerably because of the prompt action,” Bhasin said.
For Walker, being at Friday’s event was “heart-lifting,” and he was “grateful” and “blessed” to have everyone in attendance, especially the paramedics.
“They carried me out in a chair from my house,” he said. “For them to do that and get me here on time — it’s just a blessing. It’s just a touch of the heart.”
Seeing Walker at the event — “healthy, living his life, enjoying himself” — was significant, Bhasin said, and “what makes this endeavor so worthwhile.”
“These are the defining moments that I feel I wear the white coat for,” Bhasin said. “In medicine, there are outcomes sometimes that are unexpected, but on days like this, it reinforces why we all chose medicine.”
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