Introduction: Intravenous rt-PA thrombolysis has recently reached the goal to become a standard therapy for the acute stage of ischaemic stroke in many countries. Its introduction in Central Europe is slow, partly because of legislative reasons. Material and methods: During the period from January 1998 to October 2002, 56 consecutive patients were thrombolysed at the Neurology Clinic, Faculty Hospital Nitra, Slovakia, following the NINDS and ECASS study criteria. The mean baseline NIHSS was 14.5. Themeantherapeutic interval was 167 minutes.Themeandose of i.v. rt-PAwas0.7 mg/kg of patient weight. Results: After 3 months, 33.9 % of patients reached mRS 0-1, 37.5 % had mRS 2-3 and 16.1 % had mRS 4-5. Clinically important mRS of 0-2, which means full independence, was reached by 44.6 % of patients. The mortality was 12.5 %.The rate of symptomatic intracerebral haemorrhages was 8.9 %, 5.3 % were fatal. Asymptomatic haemorrhagic transformations occurred relatively frequently, in 19.6 %, with a benign course. Conclusion: The favourable outcome of i.v. thrombolysis in our group is comparable to published data from the randomised NINDS study, as well as to the ex recent clinical experience.

        Key words: thrombolysis, rt-PA, stroke team