Stroke patients should receive customized palliative care

American Heart Association/American Stroke Association scientific statement

2014-03-27

(Press-News.org) People recovering from a stroke should have a well-coordinated medical team to personalize care, optimize quality of life and minimize suffering, according to a scientific statement published in the American Heart Association journal Stroke. The statement is the first in the United States to outline fundamental palliative care for stroke survivors. Palliative care is patient- and family-centered care that improves life by anticipating, preventing and treating suffering. "The majority of stroke patients need access to some form of palliative medicine," said Robert Holloway, M.D., M.P.H., lead author of the statement and professor and chairman of the neurology department at the University of Rochester in Rochester in New York. "The stroke team and its members can manage many of the palliative care problems themselves. It encourages patient independence and informed choices." Palliative care should be a collaboration between patients, families, a stroke team and various providers, including neurologists, neurosurgeons, primary care providers, nurses and therapists, he said. As a stroke survivor or family member, you should expect your healthcare provider to: Talk about your preferences, needs and values as a guide to medical decisions. Discuss what aspects of recovery are most important to you. Have effective, sensitive discussions about your prognosis, how to deal with physical or mental losses from a stroke, and if necessary, of dying, among other serious topics. Guide you through choices about life-sustaining treatment options. Providers should address pros and cons of CPR, ventilators, feeding tubes, surgery, do-not-resuscitate orders (DNR), do-not-intubate (DNI) orders and natural feeding. Know the best treatment options for common post-stroke symptoms, including pain, other physical symptoms and psychological problems like depression and anxiety. Engage a palliative care specialist if complex issues arise. Help preserve dignity and maximize comfort throughout the course of a stroke, including during the dying process and when nearing death. "Stroke is a devastating disease that has received little attention in the area of palliative care so far," Holloway said. Nearly 800,000 people have strokes annually. About 130,000 stroke-related deaths occur in America yearly. Up to 30 percent of all survivors are permanently disabled. INFORMATION: Co-authors are Robert Arnold, M.D.; Claire Creutzfeldt, M.D.; Eldrin Lewis, M.D., M.P.H.; Barbara Lutz, Ph.D., R.N.; Robert McCann, M.D.; Alejandro Rabinstein, M.D.; Gustavo Saposnik, M.D., M.Sc.; Kevin Sheth, M.D.; Darin Zahuranec, M.D., M.S.; Gregory Zipfel, M.D. and Richard Zorowitz, M.D. For the latest heart and stroke news, follow us on Twitter: @HeartNews. For stroke science, follow the Stroke journal at @StrokeAHA_ASA. END

ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Consistent blood pressure control may cut rate of second stroke in half

2014-03-27

Stroke survivors who consistently control their blood pressure may reduce the likelihood of a second stroke by more than half, according to new research in the American Heart Association journal Stroke. For the study, researchers analyzed the results from the Vitamin Intervention for Stroke Prevention (VISP) trial, which enrolled 3,680 ischemic stroke patients ages 35 and older in 1996-2003. Ischemic strokes are caused by a clot or other blockage in a blood vessel supplying the brain. Participants had been tested for several risk factors, including blood pressure levels ...

US clean-air efforts stay on target

2014-03-27

HOUSTON – (March 27, 2014) – National efforts in the last decade to clear the air of dangerous particulate matter have been so successful that most urban areas have already attained the next benchmark, according to new research by Rice University. Atmospheric researchers at Rice studied the state implementation plans (SIPs) from 23 regions mandated by the Environmental Protection Agency to reduce particulate matter (PM) smaller than 2.5 microns (PM 2.5) to less than 15 micrograms per cubic meter by 2009. The Rice analysis appears this week in the Journal of the Air ...

Mechanical forces driving breast cancer lead to key molecular discovery

2014-03-27

The stiffening of breast tissue in breast-cancer development points to a new way to distinguish a type of breast cancer with a poor prognosis from a related, but often less deadly type, UC San Francisco researchers have found in a new study. The findings, published online March 16, 2014 in Nature Medicine, may lead eventually to new treatment focused not only on molecular targets within cancerous cells, but also on mechanical properties of surrounding tissue, the researchers said. In a mouse model of breast cancer, scientists led by Valerie Weaver, PhD, professor of ...

Notre Dame scientists develop largest developmental proteomic data set for any animal

2014-03-27

Now that the human genome is sequenced, University of Notre Dame researchers are focusing on the study of the proteome, which is the protein content of an organism, tissue or cell. Bioanalytical chemist Norman Dovichi and molecular biologist Paul Huber have successfully tracked the changing patterns of protein expression during early development of Xenopus laevis, or African clawed frog, embryos. They have developed the largest data set on developmental proteomics for any organism, and have included the single-cell zygote. Their research has uncovered an unexpected amount ...

The circadian clock is like an orchestra with many conductors

2014-03-27

ANN ARBOR—You've switched to the night shift and your weight skyrockets, or you wake at 7 a.m. on weekdays but sleep until noon on weekends—a social jet lag that can fog your Saturday and Sunday. Life runs on rhythms driven by circadian clocks, and disruption of these cycles is associated with serious physical and emotional problems, says Orie Shafer, a University of Michigan assistant professor of molecular, cellular and developmental biology. Now, new findings from Shafer and U-M doctoral student Zepeng Yao challenge the prevailing wisdom about how our body clocks ...

Scientists synthesize first functional 'designer' chromosome in yeast

2014-03-27

An international team of scientists led by Jef Boeke, PhD, director of NYU Langone Medical Center's Institute for Systems Genetics, has synthesized the first functional chromosome in yeast, an important step in the emerging field of synthetic biology, designing microorganisms to produce novel medicines, raw materials for food, and biofuels. Over the last five years, scientists have built bacterial chromosomes and viral DNA, but this is the first report of an entire eukaryotic chromosome, the threadlike structure that carries genes in the nucleus of all plant and animal ...

New way to filter light

2014-03-27

CAMBRIDGE, Mass-- Light waves can be defined by three fundamental characteristics: their color (or wavelength), polarization, and direction. While it has long been possible to selectively filter light according to its color or polarization, selectivity based on the direction of propagation has remained elusive. But now, for the first time, MIT researchers have produced a system that allows light of any color to pass through only if it is coming from one specific angle; the technique reflects all light coming from other directions. This new approach could ultimately lead ...

Quality early childhood programs help prevent chronic diseases in later life

2014-03-27

Disadvantaged children who attend high-quality early childhood development programs including healthcare and nutrition have significantly improved health as adults, reports a new study. The study was led by researchers from UCL (University College London), the University of Chicago and the University of North Carolina. These findings build upon existing evidence that high-quality early childhood programs produce better economic and social outcomes for disadvantaged children. Based on more than three decades of studying children involved in the Abecedarian program ...

Study shows promise of preserving fertility in boys with cancer

2014-03-27

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – March 27, 2014 – Scientists have moved a step closer to being able to preserve fertility in young boys who undergo chemotherapy and radiation treatments for cancer. The new research, published in Fertility and Sterility, the journal of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine, addresses the safety of an option scientists are developing for boys who aren't sexually mature and cannot bank sperm. Scientists aim to freeze a sample of the boys' testicular tissue so that when they reach adulthood, spermatogonial stem cells (SSCs) found in the ...

Research from CHORI scientists demonstrates first genome methylation in fruit fly

2014-03-27

March 27, 2013, Oakland, CA – A group of scientists from Children's Hospital Oakland Research Institute and UC Berkeley report the first mapping of genome methylation in the fruit-fly Drosophila melanogaster in their paper "Genome methylation in D. melanogaster is found at specific short motifs and is independent of DNMT2 activity," published this month in Genome Research. This paper represents a major advance in the study of DNA methylation in insects. No previous study has succeeded in pinpointing the location of DNA methylation in the fly genome. The common opinion ...

Scientists uncover the first clear evidence of air sacs in the fossilized bones of alvarezsaurian dinosaurs: the "hollow bones" which help modern day birds to fly

Alcohol makes male flies sexy

TB patients globally often incur "catastrophic costs" of up to $11,329 USD, despite many countries offering free treatment, with predominant drivers of cost being hospitalization and loss of income

Stroke patients should receive customized palliative care

ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES: