Study of a Neuroprotective Drug to Limit the Extent of Damage From an Ischemic Stroke

Minocycline is a widely used antibiotic and is approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for treatment of infections and acne. However, doctors do not know whether minocycline will work in stroke patients. Its use in stroke patients is experimental. There is a lot of information from experimental stroke studies in animals that minocycline lessens the damage from a stroke and the animals recover better. Since minocycline is generally a very safe drug in humans and does not have a lot of side effects, investigators at Georgia Health Sciences University (formerly the Medical College of Georgia) believe that it might be a safe and effective drug to improve the outcome in patients with stroke.