House passes stroke prevention legislation

The Stop Stroke Act would provide $95 million to fund programs such as telehealth networks, a national database, an awareness campaign and health professionals' training.

By Doug Trapp, AMNews staff. April 16, 2007.

Washington -- A decade ago, Lisa Deck rushed to a hospital emergency department because she had a severe headache and felt numb on her left side. Deck noticed a Stroke Awareness Month banner on the Washington, D.C., hospital's wall.

"I remember looking at that and saying, 'Wow, I have a lot of those symptoms,' " she said.

But Deck, then a 21-year-old American University senior, thought that only old men had strokes, which she believed killed people quickly. The treating physician attributed Deck's symptoms to the stress of graduating in one week. The doctor discharged her and told her to take aspirin.

Three days later, with her symptoms worsening, she went to a different hospital. After a CT scan and an MRI, she was diagnosed as having a stroke. Deck went on blood-thinning medication. She was later diagnosed with central nervous system vasculitis, a rare autoimmune disease.

Stroke treatments have advanced a great deal in the decade since Deck's incident, and awareness has improved, but both could stand more work, said Larry Goldstein, MD, director of the Stroke Center at Duke University and director of the American Heart Assn.'s Stroke Council.

A bill approved by the U.S. House late last month, the Stroke Treatment and Ongoing Prevention Act of 2007, aims to address those issues. It includes $95 million for training of health professionals, telehealth networks to connect stroke patients and physicians, a national database of treatments and outcomes, and a national awareness campaign. All are to be carried out between 2008 and 2012.