Parliament: Better stroke care could save hundreds

The chairman of the Committee of Public Accounts has said that hundreds of patients needlessly die because the NHS has failed to give stroke care the priority it needs.

Edward Leigh MP slammed the levels of investment historically allocated to stroke care, saying that the approach was “treated as going with the territory of growing old”.

He said that the UK had a lot to learn from other countries “quicker off the mark” to take to new technologies and drugs and provide better rehabilitative care.

Of the lack of parity of priority for stroke patients, Mr Leigh said: “There is absolutely no justification for this. Each year stroke afflicts more than 110,000 people of all ages, with a quarter of all stoke patients under 65 years of age.”

“The message to be driven home among healthcare professionals, including hospital staff and GPs, and also the general public is that a stroke is a medical emergency requiring a 999 response and then rapid access to scanning to determine the most appropriate treatment,” he added.

The committee estimates that strokes cost the economy approximately seven billion pounds per year, with a direct cost to the NHS of approximately 2.8 billion pounds.

It also said that there was low awareness of transient ischaemic attacks, despite the fact that they are an indication of an increased risk of stroke.

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