Ep 5: Dr Aleš Tomek | Neurology is an action-packed adventure

Meet the doctor who is leading stroke care in the Czech Republic, Stroke Society chair Dr Aleš Tomek, chief of the cerebrovascular program at the 2nd Medical Faculty of Charles University in Prague, and deputy director of its Neurology Department. The. numbers speak for themselves. Out of the 47 accredited stroke centres in the country, 35 are ESO certified centres (second only to Germany), and 45 received ESO Angels Awards in 2024. Twenty-five were diamond hospitals. Five out of the country’s 14 self-governing regions have already reached Angels Region status, which means that over four million Czech citizens, that is almost 40 percent of the population, are officially living in safe communities for stroke.

It's a remarkable achievement for a country whose predecessor state was under Soviet rule until 1989, although Soviet healthcare, despite being ill-equipped and under-resourced, was usually well-organized and prioritized equality, he said during a conversation recorded in Helsinki in May.

In the last 15 years, stroke care in  the Czech Republic has benefitted from central organization, mandatory quality indicator reporting, and coordination with the Ministry of Health, as well as the Czech affinity for rules. He says, “We like to follow strict rules, you know, and we impose them on ourselves frequently.”

In this episode:

• Choosing between medicine and molecular biology
• The value of a single Stroke Society under single leadership
• Becoming a neurologist by chance
• Neurology is an action-packed adventure
• Better too fast than too slow
• Central organization and following rules

Nature photography as a life-saving hobby

These are the numbers to know about stroke care performance in the Czech Republic:

47 – the number of accredited stroke centres in the country.

35 are ESO certified centres (second only to Germany).

45 received ESO Angels Awards in 2024, 25 were diamond hospitals.

Five out of the country’s 14 self-governing regions have already reached Angels Region status, which means that over four million Czech citizens, that is almost 40 percent of the population, are officially living in safe communities for stroke.

It’s all down to central organization, mandatory quality indicator reporting, and coordination with the Ministry of Health. So says Stroke Society chair Dr Aleš Tomek, who is also chief of the cerebrovascular program at the 2nd Medical Faculty of Charles University in Prague, and deputy director of its Neurology Department.

So when we welcomed him onto our podcast in Helsinki this past May, we talked first of all . . . about birds.