In this video, Dr. Kelly Flemming discusses a stroke program that was studied at the Mayo Clinic.
Patients in the stroke prevention program were likelier to follow a prescribed diet and exercise than those receiving traditional care, Mayo researchers found in a study supported by the American Heart Association. Sixty-one percent of patients in the physician-directed, nurse-based program reduced at least one major risk factor after one year, such as high blood pressure, diabetes, smoking or high blood cholesterol. Just 33 percent of patients receiving more traditional care improved over the same period. The patients studied had suffered an atherosclerotis stroke — a stroke caused by a blocked blood vessel leading to or within the brain — and were at high risk for a second stroke.
“The study shows that relatively modest changes to a traditional care model for chronic disease can make a major difference in the continued health of stroke patients,” says co-author Kelly Flemming, M.D., a Mayo Clinic neurologist.
