There is no cure for stroke. Treatments may include hospital care, medicines, percutaneous interventions, surgery, and rehabilitation.
Often, a form of heart disease brings on a stroke. In those cases, doctors will treat the cause of the heart disease. For example, damaged heart valves may need to be surgically repaired or replaced. Patients with atrial fibrillation, a type of arrhythmia, may need to take blood-thinning medicines (anticoagulants) to stop blood clots from forming. Oral anticoagulants (pills that you swallow) and aspirin appear to decrease the risk of stroke among patients with atrial fibrillation.
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Treatment Options
Medicines for stroke can vary. Those that help one kind of stroke may actually increase the damage caused by another kind of stroke. For example, clot-dissolving medicines may help treat an ischemic stroke (a stroke caused by a blood clot), but they may increase the damage caused by a hemorrhagic (bleeding) stroke by causing bleeding in the brain.
Tissue plasminogen activator (t-PA) is a clot-dissolving medicine approved for use by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. This medicine is a major breakthrough in the treatment of stroke caused by blood clots, which make up 87% of all strokes. Doctors cannot use t-PA for every stroke patient (it may cause bleeding in the brain), but t-PA has been found to help ischemic stroke patients when given within 3 hours of the start of stroke symptoms.
When you get to the hospital after having a stroke, doctors may give you anticoagulants (warfarin) or antiplatelet drugs (aspirin, ticlopidine, clopidogrel) to prevent another blood clot from forming. You may be given a pain reliever if you have a severe headache.
Your blood pressure may rise during a stroke, because your body tries to make up for the decreased blood flow to your brain. For this reason, lowering your blood pressure right after a stroke may not be recommended, especially in patients with chronic high blood pressure (their autoregulation of blood flow to the brain is different from people without high blood pressure).
For some patients, other treatments may include
Controlling such risk factors may prevent another stroke.
Carotid endarterectomy is a surgical procedure that removes fatty buildup (atherosclerotic plaque) in a neck artery that supplies oxygen-rich blood to the brain. The procedure may help patients who have had a stroke, but surgeons have to wait at least 6 weeks after the stroke before considering surgery. Carotid endarterectomy may also be used to prevent a stroke in people who have the fatty buildup that may cause a stroke. Doppler ultrasound can be used to find out how much buildup is in the artery and when a carotid endarterectomy may be performed to help prevent a stroke.
Cerebral angioplasty is an experimental technique not available in most hospitals. Cerebral angioplasty uses balloons, stents, and coils like those used to treat disease in the coronary arteries. The procedure can be used to treat some types of cerebral vascular problems. This technique, while very promising, is still considered experimental.
Rehabilitation
Stroke is a leading cause of long-term disability in the United States. Stroke survivors face a variety of mental and physical challenges, depending on how severely their brains were affected. With rehabilitation, most stroke survivors can improve their quality of life.
Rehabilitation helps survivors reduce their dependence on caregivers and improve physical ability. The keys to successful rehabilitation include the attitude of the survivor, the skill of the rehabilitation team, and the encouragement and cooperation of family and friends.
According to the National Stroke Association, rehabilitation options vary depending on the severity of the stroke. They may include
- A hospital rehabilitation unit.
- A rehabilitation hospital.
- Home therapy.
- Outpatient therapy.
- A long-term care facility that provides therapy and skilled nursing care.
Support
Survivors of stroke need a supportive network to help them though rehabilitation. Stroke support groups or clubs provide excellent opportunities to meet with medical experts and other survivors and their families. These clubs are also places to learn, share, and encourage.
See also on this site: Stroke
See on other sites:
American Stroke Association
www.strokeassociation.org/
The National Stroke Association
www.stroke.org
Information on stroke survivor and caregiver resources.
Updated August 2008
