Neuroprotection observed with EPO treatment in animal models of ischemic stroke and brain injury and the encouraging results in the Phase I clinical trial of EPO administration for ischemic stroke (Ehrenreich et al., 2002) did not predict the adverse events associated with the combination of EPO and systemic thrombolysis therapy (Ehrenreich et al., 2009), although some benefit with EPO treatment was suggested in further subgroup analysis of patients not receiving thrombolysis therapy (Ehrenreich et al., 2011). Here, EPO is linked to ischemic stroke.