Response to Letter by Dame

In his letter, Christof Dame1 builds on and supports the points made in the discussion part of our recent erythropoietin (EPO) stroke article.2 Especially the exploratory analysis presented in this article, showing potential beneficial effects of EPO treatment in patients nonqualifying for recombinant tissue plasminogen activator (rtPA),2,3⇓ should definitely stimulate further basic research to better understand and define potential contraindications to EPO treatment for future EPO stroke trials. For this purpose, we decided to share with your readers a new set of data obtained during our extensive post hoc evaluation of the study that might give additional insight into the risk profile of EPO treatment.