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ESOC 2021 | An innovative approach to providing stroke care: the ‘Flying Intervention Team’ service

Heinrich Audebert, MD, Charité, Center for Stroke Research Berlin, Berlin, Germany, outlines the potential of a ‘Flying Intervention Team’ (FIT) service (NCT04270513) that aims to reduce time delays to endovascular treatment in patients with acute ischemic stroke located in rural areas. Implemented by the telemedical stroke network TEMPis (Telemedical Project for integrative Stroke Care), telemedicine approaches are first used to identify eligible candidates for endovascular treatment in primary stroke centers (PSC). A team of interventionalists are then flown into the PSC from a comprehensive stroke center to instigate endovascular treatment. While the interventionalists are en route, the patient is also prepared by anesthesiologists, enabling the FIT to assist the patient immediately upon arrival. Prof. Audebert highlights the efficiency of this treatment strategy and how it avoids potentially harmful secondary hospital transfers. This measure may therefore enable the provision of high-quality stroke care in patients located in rural areas lacking access to endovascular services. This interview took place at the European Stroke Organisation Conference (ESOC), 2021.

Disclosures

Prof. Audebert reports the following disclosures:
I am the Principle Investigator of the INSPIRE-TMS and the B_PROUD studies, as well as the ULTRAFAST prehospital stroke diagnostics project. I have been member of the Flying Interventionalist Team study steering committee.
I have received honoraria for speaker and consultancy activities from Novo-Nordisk, Pfizer, MBS, Boehringer Ingelheim, Bayer Healthcare, and Medpoint. I have received institutional funding for the different areas of my research from the German Federal Ministry for Education and Research, the Deutsche Forschung Gemeinschaft, the German Innovation-Funds and the Stiftung Deutsche Schlaganfall-Hilfe.