Stroke

Providing the best stroke services possible across West Yorkshire and Harrogate to further improve quality and stroke outcomes is a priority for us all and something we are committed to achieving through the work that has been taking place across West Yorkshire and Harrogate and in each of our six local areas (Bradford District and Craven; Calderdale, Harrogate, Kirklees, Leeds and Wakefield.)

Stroke is a life changing event and evidence shows the care people receive in the first few hours can make a difference to how well they recover. This includes having specialist scans to assess the nature of the stroke and if appropriate receive clot-busting drugs (thrombolysis.)

Our work is all about:

Preventing stroke happening across the area
How best we deliver effective care when people have a stroke
Ensuring there is good support and rehabilitation for people after a stroke
Addressing the ongoing workforce challenges across the area

Please read our strategic case for change and a shorter public summary of the strategic case for change to find out about our proposals to adapt stroke services in West Yorkshire and Harrogate. There's also an easy-read version. You can also view the NHS Yorkshire and the Humber Clinical Senate's independent feedback on the strategic case for change.

We know that a stroke can have a devastating impact on a person's life, as well as their family members. Establishing what service users, their families and carers, our staff and the people of West Yorkshire and Harrogate feel and experience about stroke care is very important to us.

For details of the Department of Health National Stroke Strategy and the Royal Colleage of Physicians National Clinical Guidline for Stroke Fifth Edition 2016 please read here.

You can also find out more about our engagement with patients with experience of stroke to find out what they think about our proposals.

We know that a stroke can have a devastating impact on a person's life, as well as their family members.

September 2018 update

This information has been produced to give you an update on West Yorkshire and Harrogate (WY&H) stroke care work. Keeping everyone updated is an important part of our work. We want to keep you regularly updated so that you have the opportunity to discuss developments as they progress.

Since the previous update in February 2018 there has been lots of activity in order to progress the WY&H stroke care work. Following the workshop that took place on 2 February 2018 we scheduled further workshops in each of our six local areas (Bradford District and Craven, Calderdale, Harrogate. Kirklees, Leeds and Wakefield) which took place during the week commencing 26 March 2018. The sessions included health care professionals, community organisations and people who have experienced stroke.

A further workshop also took place on 30 May 2018. The aim of the workshop was to seek people's views on our work to date and gain their views on the development of a decision making criteria for specialist stroke services to further inform next steps.

You can read more about the workshops and what people told us here.

We have also continued to work closely with our partners, stakeholders, community and voluntary organisations, clinical experts and our staff to inform our work and have provided regular updates to the WY&H Joint Committee (held in public) and the Joint Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee (JHOSC), the WY&H Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) Assurance Group.

You can read more about what people have told us and what WY&H stroke programme has progressed to date 'you said, we did'.

You can also read how the public health needs assessment has informed our work.

You can also view the stroke report presented to West Yorkshire and Harrogate Joint Committee of the 9 Clinical Commissioning Groups on the 5 June 2018 here.

February 2018 update

This information has been produced to give you an update on West Yorkshire and Harrogate stroke care work so far.

Keeping everyone updated is an important part of our work. We want to keep you regularly updated so that you have the opportunity to discuss developments as they progress. Please see attached the draft timelines for the coming months work. Please note these are subject to change.

West Yorkshire and Harrogate stroke care event 2 February 2018
Over 50 health and social care professionals, community organisations, councillors, people who have experienced stroke and carers attended an event organised by West Yorkshire and Harrogate Health and Care Partnership (WY&H HCP) in Bradford on Friday 2 February 2018. The event builds on the public engagement work from February and March 2017, and a clinical summit in May 2017, where consultants, doctors and other health care professionals came together to consider how they could further improve stroke care across the area. You can view the slides here and read the report from the event here.

November 2017 update

This information has been produced to give you an update on West Yorkshire and Harrogate stroke care work so far.

Keeping everyone updated is an important part of our work. We want to keep you regularly updated so that you have the opportunity to discuss developments as they progress. You can also view the stroke report presented to West Yorkshire and Harrogate Joint Committee of the 11 Clinical Commissioning Groups on the 7 November 2017 and 4 July 2017 here.

The Yorkshire & Humber Academic Health Science Network working with our partnership to prevent stroke

The Yorkshire & Humber Academic Health Science Network (AHSN) is proud to partner with West Yorkshire and Harrogate, Health and Care Partnership in the delivery of an Atrial Fibrillation (AF) programme which is all about reducing the number of strokes people have across the area.

AF causes a fast and erratic heartbeat which is a major factor of stroke. The work is about detecting and treating people who are at risk of stroke so that around 9 in 10 people with AF are managed by GPs with the best local treatments, saving lives and delivering efficiencies too.

AHSN are also working closely with Right Care and the British Heart Foundation

to ensure the support they give is evidence based and delivers the best health care outcomes possible.

The work also highlights the importance of further improving awareness of the signs and symptoms of stroke.

The West Yorkshire and Harrogate programme involves the 11 clinical commissioning groups across the area. The AHSN will support 80 general practices to improve the care people receive across the area, saving a minimum of 190 strokes, over the next 3 years.

The intractable problem of irregular heart rhythm causes real problems. Every year, one in 20 people with AF will have a stroke. For every five people with AF that have a stroke, two will die, two will have to go into a care home and only one will return to their own home.

The AHSN has previously worked with West Yorkshire and Harrogate through the Heathy Futures Collaborative. In 2015, the collaborative created a commissioning strategy to improve care for people known to have AF. This successful strategy has benefitted 8,094 patients and is calculated to be preventing around 200 strokes a year.