Thank you for Sheila Hale’s long read about her family experience of stroke (My husband and son suffered strokes, 30 years apart. Shockingly little had changed, 15 May). I remember reading her book as a junior doctor and despairing at the differences between the stroke and neurorehabilitation units that I worked on. This drove my career to stroke medicine, particularly rehabilitation.
In 2021, without the technology to give thrombolysis beyond four and a half hours after a stroke, Sheila’s son was unfortunately one hour over time and the risks of severe brain bleeding outweighed the benefit. CT perfusion techniques mean that this time constraint is reducing, and mechanical thrombectomy is becoming more individually based and more available.
