What are the long term outcomes following stroke?

Press release from PLoS Medicine

2011-05-18

(Press-News.org) Despite the recognition of stroke as a major contributor to disability and mortality worldwide, little is known about the long-term outcomes among individuals who survive a stroke. In a research study reported by Charles Wolfe from King's College London and colleagues, the researchers examine outcomes for up to ten years in a cohort of people surviving their first-ever stroke in an inner city area of London, UK. The researchers show that this cohort of stroke survivors experience ongoing poor outcomes in the long term, with high levels of disability experienced immediately post stroke but with a sizeable proportion of survivors experiencing moderate to severe disability up to ten years after their first stroke. These outcomes are important for planning services and long-term management strategies for those who experience a stroke.

The authors highlight that their study "not only provides population estimates, to our knowledge for the first time, on the longer term outcomes in a diverse inner city population but highlights that stroke is truly a lifelong condition among survivors with ongoing poor outcomes".

### Funding: The study was funded by the Northern and Yorkshire National Health Service R&D Programme in Cardiovascular Disease and Stroke, Guy's and St Thomas' Hospital Charity, the Stanley Thomas Johnson Foundation, The Stroke Association, a Department of Health Health Quality Improvement Programme grant, and a National Institute for Health Research Programme Grant (RP-PG-0407-10184). CDAW acknowledges financial support from the Department of Health via the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Biomedical Research Centre award to Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust in partnership with King's College London. CDAW is an NIHR Senior Investigator. CDAW, SLC, APG, and PUH had full access to all of the data in the study and take responsibility for the integrity of the data and the accuracy of the data analysis. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

Competing Interests: APG has consultancy agreements with Pfizer Global R&D, Takeda Global R&D (Europe), Cytel, Novartis, GSK, Viphor, Helsinn, and Eli Lilly. PUH has in the past 5 years had unrestricted research grants in the area of stroke from the German Ministry of Research and Education, the European Union, the Stanley Thomas Johnson Foundation, the University of Erlangen, and the German Stroke Foundation. AMT, named as a contributing author on this paper, died before the paper was formally accepted for publication. The other authors declare no competing interests.

Citation: Wolfe CDA, Crichton SL, Heuschmann PU, McKevitt CJ, Toschke AM, et al. (2011) Estimates of Outcomes Up to Ten Years after Stroke: Analysis from the Prospective South London Stroke Register. PLoS Med 8(5): e1001033. doi:10.1371/journal.pmed.1001033

CONTACT:
Dr. Charles Wolfe
Division of Health and Social Care Research
King's College London
charles.wolfe@kcl.ac.uk

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What are the long term outcomes following stroke?

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