Improved Stroke Care

Stroke is seen as a major health concern and this is due to the fact that every year, as many as 110,000 individuals suffers from strokes making it a key issue. (NHS 2014)

As stated in Acute Stroke Intervention (Prabhakaran, Ruff, & Bernstein, 2015), one of the leading causes of death and disability in the United States are strokes. Acute ischemic stroke (AIS) results when an artery that is supplying the brain becomes blocked, this occurrence leads to cell death of brain tissue. Improving brain function after an ischemic stroke is of high priority for clinical research. General consensus shows that administration of intravenous recombinant tissue plasminogen activator (IV rtPA) therapy is helpful when introduced within 4.5 hours of ischemic stroke symptom onset. The benefit of intravenous (IV rtPA) lessens when the onset of symptoms goes beyond 4.5 hours. The use of (IV rtPA) is contraindicated when there is

Led by our chairs Samantha Sangabi and Julia Roh, our Power to End Stroke initiative has worked to break the barrier that lies between the community and the signs of stroke. With the help of the B.E.F.A.S.T method we have been able to reach out to the community and provide patients with the tools to detect and take preventative measures against stroke.

Stroke is a leading health care problem worldwide; ‘living with stroke’ is a real challenge both stroke survivors and their caregivers face.

Many people don’t know that stroke is one of the most common life threatening diseases in the U.S alone. It has been estimated that about 25% of people who have had a stroke will have another in the years to come. What people don’t tend to realize is how much money strokes cost the U.S a year. In 2003, strokes cost about $52 billion dollars.

The over the counter medication once known only for its ability of easing aches and pains or fighting off fever and inflammation is proving itself to be quite the miracle drug. Aspirin has become part of the protocol for stroke victims as a preventative measure due to its neuro-protective benefits. Stroke can cause lesions in cerebral white matter, which may result in cognitive impairments such as deficits in learning and memory. White matter lesions (WML) have also been linked to increasing the risk of post-stroke dementia. Cerebral white matter damage has been widely overlooked. Comprised of oligodendrocytes that form the insulating myelin in the CNS, white matter is evidentially just as vulnerable to ischemia as gray matter.

The abstract provided includes descriptive statistics as it is describing the population of patients in stroke rehabilitation and their incidence, characteristics and consequence of falls. After reading the abstract, there is information that I feel is missing in order to implement effective change. The abstract stated that extrinsic and intrinsic factors impacted a portion of the falls, as well as 31% of falls being unclassified. Because of the shortage of details, I would like to know more about the falls including:

In-depth, in-home interviews of forty-five minutes to sixty minutes were conducted with five community-dwelling individuals (three men, two women) aged 68-74 years who had experienced a stroke in the past year, followed by in-patient rehabilitation for a minimum of two weeks. Data analyzed using thematic analysis. Peer-review and peer debriefing with a co-researcher established

The existing, big competition on healthcare market, where the hospital reimbursement depends partially on the patients’ outcome and satisfaction, forces each hospital to stay on the top of newest evidence-based practices (EBP). This standard applies not only to physicians and the treatments they offer, but also to nursing care provided to the patients.

3000 word essay on patient with left sided stroke with one identified health need/problem: Dysphagia

Stroke is a public health burden that affects 15 million people worldwide (World Health Report, 2002), approximately 795,000 people per year in the United States (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, America’s Burden on Stroke, 2012) and specifically in Mississippi, stroke is the fifth leading cause of death (Mississippi Vital Statistics, 2014). Approximately 610,000 are first or new strokes and approximately 185,000 strokes, nearly one of four,four; occur in individuals that have had a previous stroke (Mozaffarian, Benjamin, Go, et al, 2015). Currently, there are more than 6.2 million noninstitutionalized adults who have had a stroke in the United States (Faststats, CDC, National Center for Health Statistics, 2012).

Stroke is the number one leading cause of adult disability, and it is estimated that approximately 7 million Americans are living with the effects of stroke. The direct and indirect cost of stroke in the United States was approximately $53.6 billion, with a mean lifetime cost estimated at $140,048 (American Heart Association, 2004) and each year, approximately 795,000 people have either a new or recurrent stroke (Go et al., 2013).

Evidence-Base practice (EBP) is defined as based on problems identified from nursing practice; using best evidence and professional expertise and merging them into current practice to ensure patients receive quality care (French, 1999). Evidence-based practice is a part of quality improvement process; it is made of evidence, clinical expertise, patient preference and the context of care (Barker, 2013). In brief, evidence-based practice is the guideline in the nursing practice that requires nurses gather and use clinical evidence to help diagnose or assess patients correctly by using their knowledge and experience in order they can deliver the quality of care to the patients (Ellis, 2013). In the other words, in the nursing practice the clinical evidence supports all the nursing procedures performed.

Approximately 15 million people suffer a stroke worldwide each year, of those 5 million die and another 5 million are permanently disabled Mackay et al (2004). Stroke tends to affect people over the age of 75 (Scarborough et al 2009). Since almost 70% of people over 75 retain some teeth (Todd and Laden 1998), maintaining a healthy mouth is important for elderly stroke patients. Not only does effective oral care play a central role in the prevention of infection, a healthy mouth also makes a real difference to a person’s quality of life (McGrath and Bedi 1998) and maintenance of nutritional status (Jones 1998) .For these reasons, this dissertation will examine the benefits of good oral hygiene for elderly stroke patients and nurses role in

Sorry to hear about your grandmother. Hope all is well. As of now ,no one in my family experienced a stroke and hoping it stays that way. Strokes or any disease can happen to any one. We are future nurses and will be dealing with strokes and much more. Being a nurse comes from the heart and is strived with compassion, love, and integrity.