How to Set up an Acute Stroke Service

Description

• Concise and practical guide on how to set up and run an acute stroke service
• Explains how best to implement timely multidisciplinary treatment
• Written by experts with personal experience in creating and operating a world class stroke unit

Stroke is a leading cause of death and disability throughout the world. Intravenous lytics and endovascular stroke treatment were demonstrated to be highly beneficial in clinical trials and in achieving net cost savings. However, time is of the essence in the management of stroke as for every minute that stroke is left untreated, an estimated 1.9 million neurons are destroyed. An optimized stroke pathway can dramatically impact patient outcome. Every medical service will differ.

This book offers a concise and practical guide on how to set up and efficiently run an acute stroke service tailored to the needs of the individual center as a provider of primary, secondary, or tertiary care. It documents the essential knowledge on current imaging and treatment options and offers guidance in organizing a site-specific stroke pathway that will ensure the quickest possible provision of treatment, thereby optimizing benefit to the patient and maximizing cost-effectiveness.

The authors played an integral part in the development and operation of one of Europe’s most successful early stroke centers and also have experience of the factors that can undermine the creation of world-class stroke units. On this basis, they address the key aspects of the stroke pathway and explain how organizing this can reduce the number of severe outcomes by ensuring that appropriate steps are taken during the early moments after stroke when intervention can make a profound difference. The challenging, multidisciplinary nature of care is emphasized, and this handbook will be an invaluable source for every member of the stroke team, including doctors, nurses, stroke coordinators, emergency and rehabilitation providers as well as hospital administrators.

Content Level » Professional/practitioner
Keywords » Health Care - Management - Pathway - Stroke - Stroke Service - Treatment
Related subjects » Critical Care & Emergency Medicine - Internal Medicine - Medicine - Neurology

AUTHORS & EDITORS

Professor Iris Quasar Grunwald studied Medicine in Germany and did her residency training in Neurology and Radiology at the Saarland University, where she became Co-director and Associate Professor of Diagnostic and Interventional Neuroradiology. She obtained her PhD in Radiology and Neuroradiology and a Master in Health Economics and Hospital Management. Dr. Grunwald has published more than 70 peer reviewed articles and several book chapters, mainly in the field of neurointervention. She has specific expertise in procedures such as intracerebral intra-arterial fibrinolysis and thrombectomy for emergency stroke therapy and intracranial angioplasty and stenting. Professor Grunwald has an international reputation in implementing acute stroke interventions and has been involved with research projects related to building and enabling acute stroke interventions regionally within the Saarland, nationally within Germany as well as internationally as European Principal Investigator in international clinical trials related to revascularisation in acute stroke. In addition she has conducted several lecture tours to leading US clinical stroke centers on the subjects of acute stroke intervention and management. In February 2009 she transferred her practice to the UK, Oxford University, to build up a stroke service within the Acute Vascular Imaging Centre in Oxford from where she leads several international trials.