Hamilton County Major Jim Coppinger welcomes visiting stroke specialists from Latin America to Erlanger’s quarterly seminar for members of the international medical community
Eleven Latin American neuro specialists attended a training program focusing on Regional Stroke Care and Financial Operations. This program, geared for the international medical community, is part of an ongoing course taught quarterly by key faculty at the Erlanger Southeast Regional Stroke Center and Neuroscience Institute.
At a “Bienvenidos” welcome dinner, physician delegations from Mexico, Ecuador, Costa Rica, Brazil, and Colombia met with Erlanger President and CEO Kevin Spiegel, FACHE and Chief Operating Officer Rob Brooks to share their experiences.
Joining the international physician delegation were Dr. Blaise Baxter, Erlanger chief of Radiology; Dr. Thomas Devlin, director of the Erlanger Neuroscience Institute, Traci Jennings, assistant vice-president of the Neuroscience Institute and Peter Catalano, director of Stroke Consulting Services. During the dinner meeting, each physician described the challenges of practicing high-quality stroke care in regions of the world lacking the infrastructure and financial support available in the United States.
During the seminar, led by Dr. Devlin and Ms. Jennings, the eleven physicians learned about building an advanced Regional Stroke Center, along with developing a referral base of hospitals in outlying areas. The Latin America guests toured Erlanger facilities and came away with new ideas for strengthening their programs back home.
Another member of the Erlanger Seminar faculty was Dr. Raul Nogueira, president of the Society of Vascular and Interventional Neurology and Professor of Neurology at Emory University. Dr. Nogueira, along with his Brazilian colleagues at the Brazilian Ministry of Health, is performing clinical trials of thrombectomy procedures (mechanical clot extraction devices for stroke). The objective of these trials is to validate the utility of endovascular stroke treatment within the reality of the public healthcare systems in developing nations.
Among the leading physicians attending the Erlanger seminar were Dr. Nogueira’s co-authors on Stroke Care guidelines for Brazil, Drs. Octavio Pontes-Neto and Daniel Abud (directors of the Stroke and Neuroendovascular programs at Universidade de Sao Paulo – Ribeirao Preto).
Dr. Devlin concluded the seminar by offering participants a peek at new technology used for diagnosing strokes with an automated TransCranial Doppler system. This system, currently under development with Dr. Devlin’s research team, is hoped to significantly reduce diagnostic costs and time to treatment for acute stroke. Seminar participants saw this new technology as a potential path to high-quality care that could be supported by insurance and income levels in much of Latin America.
Visiting stroke specialists from five Latin American countries tour Erlanger with Drs. Thomas Devlin and Blaise Baxter