Case Study in Billings, MT

How Blue Sky Telehealth Saves Lives

Teresa went out one night expecting a normal dinner, but little did she know she was in for the health scare of her life. While getting up to leave, Teresa realized she wasn’t able to lift her arm to put on her coat. As the situation escalated, she suddenly couldn’t stand up or speak. After realizing she was having a stroke, she was immediately rushed to the nearest emergency room.

By the time Teresa got to the hospital, her scans indicated there was a very large clot in the left middle cerebral artery. The team at the Billings clinic got in touch with Blue Sky Telehealth, who was able to analyze the scan immediately. The Blue Sky physician on call, Dr. Wagner, met with Teresa via video call, and although she seemed as though nothing was wrong other than some light facial drooping on the right side of her mouth, her CT scans had returned with problematic results.

By working together to further assess her situation, they determined she had one of the most common types of strokes caused by a blood clot blocking blood flow to the brain. Teresa was suffering from a Tandem Occlusion, where she actually had two separate blood clots blocking flow. The outcome of this kind of situation is solely determined by the time it takes to get proper blood circulation back to the brain. The more time it takes to accomplish this goal, the more likely the chance that there will be permanent, irreversible damage, resulting in a high chance of disability or death.

In Teresa’s life-threatening situation, she was lucky to get the proper diagnosis as quickly as she did.

By having a live video call, doctors are able to get a more accurate understanding of what’s happening. “A normal phone call would have resulted in a back to normal diagnoses and an admittance for a TIA evaluation, which is a pre-warning stroke,” Dr. Wagner said. This would have been terrible in Teresa’s case because it could have led to major stroke.

Teresa’s story is a perfect example of how telehealth can improve patient care in some of the most critical and life-threatening moments.

For more information on our telehealth services, please call us at (303) 900-4258 today!