Community stories

Stroke survivors are our teachers. From them we learn what courage looks like outside the hospital doors. They show us when we succeed and when the system fails, and they remind us why this community matters.

The past decade has not only fundamentally changed post-acute stroke care in Europe, it also changed perceptions of stroke nurses’ role in hospitals, and established the power of nurses to influence practice.

Inside an ambulance there is a different universe, paramedics believe. “Every time I work in the ambulance car, I feel better because I am doing something for society, for someone. It’s good to be there. Every EMS worker feels the same way.”

Children enrolled in FAST Heroes at their schools learn about the most common symptoms of stroke and the importance of calling an ambulance immediately if these symptoms appear. It relies on children’s enthusiasm for learning and sharing to transfer knowledge about stroke to their parents and grandparents.

The Angels Awards bring the key components of stroke care into focus and make data collection integral to care, thereby creating the necessary conditions for quality monitoring. But they have also proved to be useful for removing roadblocks to transformation.

Learning, like changing, requires an open mind that embraces the idea that there may be a better way to do things. Before any learning can take place, we must, in the words of one expert, place ‘a welcome mat at the threshold of the mind’.