General perception of stroke

doi:10.1136/bmj.325.7360.392/a

BMJ 2002;325:392 ( 17 August )

Letters

General perception of stroke

Knowledge of stroke is lacking

Poor knowledge of stroke can be improved by simple measures

Knowledge of stroke is lacking

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

EDITOR $---$ Yoon and Byles found that the recognition of symptoms of stroke and risk factors for it was poor.¹ Lack of knowledgeresults in delays in seeking medical care.² As a result, patientswith stroke may fail to gain the benefits of acute treatments $---$ forexample, acute thrombolysis $---$ because of the narrow therapeuticwindow.³

We conducted a large prospective questionnaire study among elderly patients attending a UK hospital clinic.⁴ Patients withestablished risk factors for stroke (atrial fibrillation, diabetes,hypertension, previous stroke, transient ischaemic attack) wereinterviewed. A total of 410 patients (mean age 78) gave theirresponses to a semi-structuredquestionnaire.

Altogether 336 patients could identify the symptoms of stroke correctly; the remainder were not sure or gave incorrect answers.Forty one thought that stroke is caused by damage to the heart,and 353 correctly correlated stroke with brain damage. On freerecall, 267 correctly identified at least one established riskfactor . . . [Full text of this article]

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Perceptions of stroke in the general public and patients with stroke: a qualitative study: Sung Sug Yoon and Julie Byles
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