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Caregiving

Helping a Loved One Recover From a Stroke

Summary & Participants

This year over 300,000 people in the United States will suffer a stroke, many of whom are elderly. Following the immediate crisis there are long term health care issues that their families face. Join our panel of experts as they discuss what every family should know about taking care of a recovering stroke survivor.

Medically Reviewed On: May 07, 2008

Webcast Transcript

WILLIAM BULMAN, MD: What can be confusing for some individuals that a stroke can be a very variable, acute illness. It depends entirely on the portion of the brain that is affected and the size of that area of the brain that is affected. A stroke can cause as most people are commonly familiar with a weakness of one side of the body, either weakness of an arm and leg. It can also manifest as isolated weakness of just one side of the face. It can also result in difficulty speaking, difficulty swallowing, or blindness of one or both eyes. A stroke is a very varied thing.

If a person has acute onset of symptoms that suggests to them that they might be having a stroke, any weakness or loss of sensation in a body part, or any sudden change in their ability to speak or comprehend, they should seek medical care immediately. The reason being that in the last several years, we have developed acute treatments for stroke. If the stroke has occurred because of a blood clot we can dissolve the blood clot immediately and perhaps save the portion of the brain that was affected by the stroke.

The reason that I stress the word immediate is that there is a window of about six hours in which we can give this therapy to people if they are a candidate for it. When someone is outside that six hour window, we are left with treating the stroke as we had before we had this therapy available.

LISA CLARK: Time is really critical.

WILLIAM BULMAN, MD: Time is critical.

LISA CLARK: How common is it for stroke victims to require either in home care or facility care after they have a stroke after the hospital stay, of course?

WILLIAM BULMAN, MD: Approximately 40% of people who have a stroke and survive it will go onto to recover fully. The remaining 60% have some disability. That degree of disability that someone has at the initial time of their stroke is not necessarily the degree of disability that they will have forever.

There is definitely a recovery period. We use a simple rule of thumb. After about a month after a stroke with good aggressive physical therapy, approximately 50% of what we could expect to return in terms of function should have could have come back. After about 12 months, just about everything that you can expect to recover should have recovered. Most people outside the 12 month window are sort of left with the disability that their stroke has given them.

I would say that every stroke victim benefits from aggressive physical therapy irrespective of what type of stroke they have had or where their stroke is. Institution of physical therapy and occupational therapy immediately after the stroke will optimize the amount of recover that they are going to have from that stroke.

LISA CLARK: I want to get to that in just a minute but first I want to ask when families are trying to choose between home and facility care, what questions do they need to ask the doctor.

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