New stroke service standards are a necessary reset

 

This is the whole problem in stroke enumerated in one word; 'care'; NOT RECOVERY!

My god, anyone in the business world would be fired immediately for managing or caring about something rather than delivering RESULTS. And this is why this is a complete fucking failure! This does nothing to guarantee recovery for survivors!

If your hospital is touting 'care' it means they are a failure because they are delivering 'care'; NOT RECOVERY! I would never go to a failed hospital! Anytime I see the word 'care' associated with a stroke hospital; I immediately think fucking failure!

YOU have to get involved and change this failure mindset of 'care' to 100% RECOVERY! Survivors want RECOVERY, NOT 'CARE'!

I see nothing here that states going for 100% recovery! You need to create EXACT PROTOCOLS FOR THAT!

ASK SURVIVORS WHAT THEY WANT, THEY'LL NEVER RESPOND 'CARE'! This tyranny of low expectations has to be completely rooted out of any stroke conversation! I wouldn't go there because of such incompetency as not having 100% recovery protocols!

RECOVERY IS THE ONLY GOAL IN STROKE!

GET THERE!

New stroke service standards are a necessary reset

A new scoring system reflects updated stroke care standards, revealing some worrying service gaps

Since its inception in 2013, the Sentinel Stroke National Audit Programme (SSNAP) has been a foundational part of the quality improvement infrastructure for stroke care(NOT RECOVERY!) across England, Wales, and Northern Ireland. For more than a decade, SSNAP has provided timely, detailed, and clinically meaningful data to help stroke teams, commissioners, and health systems track performance, target investment, and improve care(NOT RECOVERY!).

In October 2024, SSNAP introduced its most substantial reform to date: a recalibration of both its dataset and scoring methodology. The first recalibrated data covering April to June 2025 will be publicly available in October. This change was critical to ensure the process score for clinical teams reflected the new evidence collated within the 2023 National Institute for Health and care(NOT RECOVERY!) Excellence stroke rehabilitation guideline and the 2023 National Clinical Guideline for Stroke for the UK and Ireland.

SSNAP has reviewed all previous scoring and kept 40 key indicators grouped into seven domains across the entire stroke pathway, from hyperacute intervention to long-term rehabilitation. Each domain continues to be scored A to E, with those scores contributing to an overall summary rating – a format familiar to stroke teams but now weighted towards the best evidence-based medicine to improve outcomes for stroke survivors.

The anticipated effect is clear: many services which consistently scored “A” or “B” under the previous framework will now have a lower rating. There is understandably a real risk that this change could be misinterpreted – by the public and professionals alike – as a decline in standards. But importantly, this shift is not a reflection of worsening care(NOT RECOVERY!), but of recalibrated expectations. Instead, it sets a new benchmark for what best practice looks like in the current clinical context. Stroke survivors and their families should not lose confidence in stroke services, and clinicians must not feel their efforts have been devalued.

The rationale for the SSNAP data recalibration is methodologically, statistically, and clinically sound. Stroke care(NOT RECOVERY!), and the evidence behind it, has evolved rapidly and significantly over the last decade, and therefore, stroke teams need to know they are delivering the most effective care(NOT RECOVERY!).