Saema Ansar

Title : Novel therapeutic strategies to improve t-PA therapy and promote recovery after stroke

Abstract:

Each year 15 million people suffer from a stroke and it is the number one cause of disability worldwide and a major drain on health cost. The only available FDA-approved drug therapy for ischemic stroke today is tissue plasminogen activator (t-PA), which is used to dissolve the occluding clot. However, less than 10% of patients actually receive this therapy because of the very limited time-window in which t-PA can be safely administered. If t-PA is given later than 4.5 hours after stroke onset, the patient is at risk for a hemorrhagic transformation within the infarct. It is thought that metalloproteinases (MMPs) are the key culprit in causing hemorrhagic transformation. In this presentation a therapeutic approach which improve the safety of t-PA administration by blocking MMP-9 will be presented. Our results suggest that blocking MMP-9 is a promising adjuvant strategy to alleviate the detrimental side effects of delayed t-PA treatment. These results provide new insights into how we can improve the only FDA approved treatment for ischemic stroke.

Audience take away:

• Insight into how we can improve the only FDA approved drug

Biography:

SaemaAnsar is an Associate Professor at Department of Clinical Science of Lund University Sweden. She completed her PhD at Lund University, Sweden in 2007. Afterwards she performed two postdoctoral trainings at Department of Neurology at Heidelberg University, Germany and at Glostrup Research Institute, Copenhagen University, Denmark. She has well-recognized expertise in the field of stroke, vascular research, physiology, pharmacology, drug delivery and advanced imaging technology such as MRI. She is teaching at the medical programme at the Medical Faculty at Lund University and has supervised more than 20 graduate and undergraduate students. She has published more than 25 papers in reputed journals.