The lastest research on Stroke treatment.

This is a lesson that should have been learnt two years ago; if you have a stroke you are more likely to survive if you get specialist treatment as soon as possible. If you have a stroke, the sooner you have specialist treatment the less severe the damage will be.

As a result, the NHS in London shut most of its stroke units (nearly every London Accident and Emergency treated strokes before). In their place came a few specialist units staffed 24/7 by qualified Doctors and Nurses specialising in the treatment of strokes.

Result? Improved outcomes for patients and a better work/life balance for staff.

This study shows what happens if you don’t do that and what the result of having too few staff is;

By Sophie Borland Health Correspondent for the Daily Mail

 

Published: 01:02, 2 December 2014  | Updated: 08:15, 2 December 2014 

 

Stroke patients are a third more likely to die if admitted to units which are

badly staffed on Saturday mornings

 

Sir Bruce Keogh, the NHS medical director, is leading a major review of how

hospitals can encourage senior staff to work at weekends.

 

It follows a series of studies suggesting that patients admitted on a Saturday

or Sunday are up to 16 per cent more likely to die.

 

But the doctors’ union, the British Medical Association, has described the plans

as ‘unworkable’ as the NHS cannot afford to employ more senior staff at

weekends.

 

Because so few specialist stroke doctors work at weekends the researchers looked at the number of nurses on wards at 10am on a Saturday.

They found the chances of stroke victims dying within 30 days of being admitted on a Saturday were a third higher on wards where there were an average of three nurses for every 20 beds compared to those with three nurses to 10 beds.

 

The few doctors who work weekends are ‘firefighting’ in A&E, and stroke patients at risk of being neglected.

NHS guidelines state there should be at least three nurses for every ten

patients on a stroke unit at all times.

 

But figures show that only 27 per cent of the 183 NHS hospitals with stroke

units have at least three nurses for ten patients at weekends.

 

Professor Rudd said: ‘Even really big hospitals have very few staff at nights and weekends and most of those are going to be firefighting admissions down in the emergency department.

‘Patients sitting on a ward – there’s less observation 20 or 30 years ago when

every ward would have had their own doctors on 24 hours a day.

 

‘When I was training, whether you were doing urology (kidneys and bladder) or

neurology (the brain), every team would have had their rota. That’s all gone

now.

 

‘In that situation, we are very dependent on skilled nurses to recognise when

someone might be on the brink of developing a chest infection or a blood clot on the lungs or any other complication that can happen with stroke.

‘If those conditions do get picked up early, they are much more effectively treated.

‘Nursing levels can make a big difference to whether or not you survive after a

stroke.’

Around 125,000 patients suffer a stroke in England every year and they cause

40,000 deaths.

The study – published in the journal PLOS One - did not calculate exactly how

many of these can be directly blamed on a lack of weekend staff.

 

Sir Bruce Keogh, the NHS medical director, is leading a major review of how

hospitals can encourage senior staff to work at weekends

The study found that the risk of patients dying within 30 days on units which

did have three nurses for every ten patients was 11.2 per cent.

 

But this rose to 15.2 per cent on units which had half the safe level of nurses

– three for every 20 beds.

Jon Barrick, Chief Executive of the Stroke Association said: ‘Stroke is an

emergency and it can happen at any time. Patients should receive specialist care around the clock and a lack of staff will mean they will suffer unnecessarily.

‘There is a considerable body of evidence showing the level of care you receive

in the first few hours after your stroke, as well as in the longer-term, can

make a big difference to your recovery.’

Dr Peter Carter, Chief Executive and General Secretary of the Royal College of

Nursing, said: ‘It’s unacceptable that so many hospitals are still failing to

make sure they have enough nurses on duty to care for stroke patients.

‘If a hospital has enough nurses in place, stroke patients are more likely to

survive and to recover.’

 

So now you know.

London’s experience is to shut stroke units and have regional units which have sufficient staff on rotas to deal with stroke patients at any time. The collegiate atmosphere produces better trained and motivated staff.

How about it?

Neil Harris

(a don’t stop till you drop production)

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