Expansion of innovative stroke service will reduce disability and deaths | Latest news

Nottingham University Hospital (NUH) NHS Trust is investing £13.5 million to enable the expansion of their mechanical thrombectomy service to a 24/7 service for people in the East Midlands. Mechanical Thrombectomy may be appropriate for some patients who suffer from a large clot related stroke. These types of strokes often lead to severe disability, and in many instances increases the risk of death. Mechanical Thrombectomy procedures can save lives and, in some instances, can lead to rapid and complete recovery to those who would have likely needed to stay in hospital for a long time.

Mechanical thrombectomy is a procedure that removes blood clots in patients who have had very severe strokes. Roughly 100,000 people every year suffer a stroke in the UK, causing devastation for the patient and their families. NUH treats 1200 stroke patients every year and currently provides a  mechanical thrombectomy service operating Monday to Wednesday 8am – 6pm, and Thursday and Friday 8am – 4pm. It is hoped through this investment the Trust will be able to:  

• Significantly reduce long term disability in stroke patients
• Reduce the risk of death from severe strokes
• Improve quality of life for stroke survivors
• Reduce the need for long term care of stroke survivors from social services and family members
• Reduce the length of hospital stay for stroke patients
• Allow patients to go back to work after making a significant recovery
• Save tax payers money over the long term
• Enhance Nottingham’s regional centre status for stroke treatment.

Specialty General Manager-Stroke and General medicine, Ceris Challenger, said “Mechanical thrombectomy is an effective way of reducing life changing disability that can be caused through having a stroke. Last year 65% of patients from the East Midlands that were treated with this procedure experienced an improvement within 24 hours. Ensuring that we can offer this service any time of any day of the week will mean giving more patients greater independence and significant improvements to their quality of life. We estimate that, every year, around 700 patients from across the East Midlands will benefit from this treatment when we expand to become 24/7. This means that every year NUH could support 266 patients having a significantly reduced disabled outcome, and 140 patients experiencing near full recovery immediately after a stroke.”  

Dr Ganesh Subramanian, the regional Clinical Director for Stroke in the East Midlands, also said “This is a tremendous opportunity, that not only benefits the patients in Nottingham, but a much wider area. This is not the only innovation we are looking at in the East Midlands as we are also looking at implementing artificial intelligence software for rapid exchange of brain scans, which would help further in identifying appropriate patients for Mechanical Thrombectomy.”

Over the next 18 months, the Mechanical Thrombectomy service will gradually be expanding the hours of service provision, aiming to be 24/7 in early 2024.

More information about NUH’s stroke services can be found here - Stroke Medicine | NUH