Bethesda Memorial Hospital Testing Bat-Based Stroke Drug

Jul. 4–Vampire bats might soon become a stroke patient’s best friend.

A new clot-busting drug for strokes being tested at Bethesda Memorial Hospital in Boynton Beach is a genetically engineered version of an ingredient found in vampire bat saliva.

Called desmoteplase, the drug dissolves blood clots in the brain and can be used within nine hours of a stroke. TPA, the clot-busting drug now used by most doctors for stroke patients, can only be used within three hours of the stroke and can cause excessive bleeding.

“Its effect is multiplied and more intense than TPA. It has less in the way of bleeding side effects,” said Dr. Mark Brody, the neurologist leading the trial at Bethesda.

The drug is in the last phase of its clinical trial and could go before the Food and Drug Administration for approval by 2007.

Brody said the trial, which started Friday, will last about a year and a half and use the drug on about 300 people who come to Bethesda’s emergency room with a stroke. The drug is made by Forest Laboratories.

“If it’s successful, it would expand the number of people who could be treated because the window is so much longer,” Brody said.

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