After suffering a stroke while on the job in Islamorada, Urbano Matos was whisked to Baptist Hospital where doctors removed a clot stopping blood supply to his brain—before it could cause lasting damage.
Hi, my name is Ruano Matos. 57 years old. I live in Alama, Rada, Florida. And I'm a handyman. The typical day here in Alma Rada is awesome just being here and I get to do my side jobs. Uh, my jobs, uh, two or three days out of the week. I don't have to work that much is what I love about this. Living in the keys. I don't have to do much. My wife and I, we live here in this camper in the keys. We remodeled the camper. This is the outcome. My wife and I have three kids, four granddaughters. And, uh, we enjoy living here. This property belongs to my aunt. We've been here for two years, which is also lobster walk, uh, which they sell live lobsters and they're open to the public. The day of the stroke was August 28th. We were working in, in a house doing some kitchen cabinets and I dropped my phone, I bend over to get it and then I started slurring words. I got my phone got back up and then I fell over and knocked my buddy down and then he told me I was having a stroke. My left side was all uh numb. Uh I was on the ground. I couldn't get up when the paramedics got there. They, they got me up and put me on a stretcher and they started giving me medication. Took me, we met the helicopter and in 22 minutes, I was in Baptist Maine Hospital. I remember the day that we got the tone from Islamorada fire rescue to go um pick up Mr Matos. So immediately I started getting dressed and once they toned us out to launch and go pick up Mr Matos in the air, we started asking for report and getting all the information we really needed to be able to give the best care. When I saw Mr Matos, he was a little altered, um complete deficits on one side of his body slurred speech. Um really couldn't tell me much. I was able to get some information, information from the EMS personnel, but my goal was to hurry up and get him here to Baptist as quick as possible. Having the ability to connect with the stroke nurses here and the er I was able to give them all the details that really needed to really make sure that the team was ready to go to receive Mr Matos when he got here to Baptist Hospital. So, acute stroke is basically when an artery of the brain gets blocked, it gets secluded typically from a clot and it's a medical emergency because especially in this case, the main artery that supplies the entire brain on that side was occluded. And so that we know the outcomes in this patient is very poor. Without intervention, we do a position called mechanical thrombectomy. So we access the femoral artery or the radial artery and we reach the artery which is blocked and bring flow back to the part of the brain. So for the procedure, we, these are the brain vessels, we navigate a small wire into the arteries to reach the clot here. And then we pass the cat inside the clock, we deploy the device because in this case is uh it looks like a stent and then the stent kind of grabs the clot. Once the clot is grabbed, it would bring the clot out when I woke up. Um I, I felt no, it was just amazing. I mean, the next day uh after surgery, Doctor Infante came by and and told me you are not the same person that I saw and operated on yesterday. He said it's incredible. I was able to meet Mr Matos immediately. The day after I happened to be working here at Baptist that day, I didn't even recognize him. He was talking to me looking at me no neural deficits and he just seemed like a brand new person and it was nice to be able to close the loop and see the great outcomes. Um and all the care that we did and the benefits it had to bring him here if it wouldn't have been for the helicopter and it would have been driven down or up to, to Miami. I probably would be here today. It's very important for patients to come to a so called Comprehensive Stroke Center where there's a system in place to take care of these patients. Reason number one, all the data shows that in high volume surgical center, the outcomes are better. Number one, number two, we're all involved in clinical trials and therefore bringing the latest and greatest new technology to patients. The Baptist hospital staff, they're amazing. Uh I, I felt like I was in a, a five star hotel even though I was in IC U. But uh it was awesome, the staff, the people, everybody, the doctors, everybody, I I couldn't ask for a better place to be, but the procedure was successful and the patient did extremely well. So his, his future is good. He will, he will do very, very well. We were successful in doing the procedure and such as the period was done very fast. I have not smoked a cigarette. I have not drank a beer since that day. And the way I look at it is it, it's an opportunity that, that, that I've got in life to share with my wife and my kids and my grandkids for a longer time.
