October 10, 2013
April Flowers for redOrbit.com Your Universe Online
Current treatments and prevention methods, aimed at improving the quality of life for people who have experienced a stroke, are poorer than researchers have hoped, according to a new study from the UK. Despite best efforts, the researchers found that strokes still take nearly three out of five quality years off a persons life.
The findings, published online in the journal Neurology, leave considerable room for improvement in treating stroke, which is the leading cause of adult disability and the fourth-leading cause of death in the United States.
These results highlight the severe toll that stroke takes on millions of people every year, said Peter M. Rothwell, FMedSci, a professor with the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford, United Kingdom. This is the first study since the 1990s to look at long-term quality of life after stroke and transient ischemic attack (TIA).
The researchers followed 748 people who experienced stroke and 440 who had a TIA for five years. The patients were given questionnaires that measured quality of life and utility, which places a numerical value on the desirability of various health outcomes. These numeric values based on responses from the general public range from worse than death to perfect health. The participants responses were compared to an age-matched control group. Increasingly, such measures are being used to determine the cost-effectiveness of new treatment.
The five-year quality-adjusted life years were determined for the participants. The researchers calculated the quality-adjusted life years by multiplying the time spent in a health state by the value assigned to that particular health state. Out of a possible five years of perfect health, for example, the researchers found that people who had a stroke lost 1.71 years due to earlier death and another 1.08 years due to a reduced quality of life. This resulted in a reduction of 2.79 quality-adjusted life years. Depending on the severity of the stroke, these results varied greatly. For example, those having a minor stroke experienced 2.06 fewer quality-adjusted life years; moderate, 3.35 years; and severe, 4.3 quality years. Patients who experienced TIAs had 1.68 fewer quality-adjusted life years.
Our study should serve as a wake-up call that we need more funding and research for stroke treatments and secondary stroke prevention measures to improve quality of life in stroke survivors, said Rothwell.
Source: April Flowers for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online
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Suffering A Stroke Can Take Years Off Your Life