Device may help increase chances for a full recovery from a stroke
Thursday, August 5, 2010
By: Judith Salkin

The Desert Sun

For Philip Latorre, March 25 was the day his life almost completely changed.

After a relaxing dinner, the 67-year-old part-time Indio resident collapsed inside a Target store. Luckily, he was helped by people who recognized the signs of a stroke.

“I remember walking through the store feeling disoriented,” Latorre said from his Bay Area home in Milbray. “And the feeling that I was going down.”

When EMTs arrived, they insisted Latorre be treated at Eisenhower Medical Center in Rancho Mirage because of its Acute Stroke Team — a multidisciplinary group comprised by neurologists, interventional radiologists, nurse practitioners and emergency physicians.

Latorre had suffered an ischemic stroke, a clot lodged in a blood vessel that blocks the blood supply to part of the brain.

“It isn't a question of if there will be cell death,” said board-certified radiologist Dr. Mehran Elly, section chief of radiology at Eisenhower. “Brain cells begin to die as soon as the blood supply to the brain is interrupted.”

For Latorre, time was of the essence.

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