Grant: Travel Awards - Institute Community Support

There are two types of stroke - the most fatal type is known as intracerebral hemorrhage, where patients bleed into their brain. When neurologists see these patients, our role goes beyond providing medical care - it also involves providing clear communication and counselling around prognosis to family members. What family members often want to know from us is what are the chances of their loved ones surviving this and getting better. One of the ways we can try to answer that question is by assessing the severity of the stroke using a combination of clinical and radiographic features. These are then combined to calculate a clinical severity score, which has been shown before to be predictive of long-term mortality and functional outcome. However, the current practice is to calculate these scores when patients initially arrive to hospital, which can result in inaccurate prognosis. We proposed to delay the calculation of these severity scores to day 2, and to incorporate new radiographic information to guide our prognosis. We analyzed data from an international hemorrhagic stroke collaboration, and were able to demonstrate improved predictive accuracy at 3 months using this new method of prognostication. We hope to share this information with researchers and healthcare providers worldwide in order to improve care for hemorrhagic stroke patients.