More than 2,400 years ago the father of medicine, Hippocrates, recognized and described stroke-the sudden onset of paralysis. Until recently, modern medicine has had very little power over this disease, but the world of stroke medicine is changing and new and better therapies are being developed every day. Today, some people who have a stroke can walk away from the attack with no or few disabilities if they are treated promptly. Doctors can finally offer stroke patients and their families the one thing that until now has been so hard to give: hope.

In ancient times stroke was called apoplexy, a general term that physicians applied to anyone suddenly struck down with paralysis. Because many conditions can lead to sudden paralysis, the term apoplexy did not indicate a specific diagnosis or cause. Physicians knew very little about the cause of stroke and the only established therapy was to feed and care for the patient until the attack ran its course.

The first person to investigate the pathological signs of apoplexy was Johann Jacob Wepfer. Born in Schaffhausen, Switzerland, in 1620, Wepfer studied medicine and was the first to identify postmortem signs of bleeding in the brains of patients who died of apoplexy. From autopsy studies he gained knowledge of the carotid and vertebral arteries that supply the brain with blood. He also was the first person to suggest that apoplexy, in addition to being caused by bleeding in the brain, could be caused by a blockage of one of the main arteries supplying blood to the brain; thus stroke became known as a cerebrovascular disease ("cerebro" refers to a part of the brain; "vascular" refers to the blood vessels and arteries).

Medical science would eventually confirm Wepfer's hypotheses, but until very recently doctors could offer little in the area of therapy. Over the last two decades basic and clinical investigators, many of them sponsored and funded in part by the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS), have learned a great deal about stroke. They have identified major risk factors for the disease and have developed surgical techniques and drug treatments for the prevention of stroke. But perhaps the most exciting new development in the field of stroke research is the recent approval of a drug treatment that can reverse the course of stroke if given during the first few hours after the onset of symptoms.

Studies with animals have shown that brain injury occurs within minutes of a stroke and can become irreversible within as little as an hour. In humans, brain damage begins from the moment the stroke starts and often continues for days afterward. Scientists now know that there is a very short window of opportunity for treatment of the most common form of stroke. Because of these and other advances in the field of cerebrovascular disease stroke patients now have a chance for survival and recovery.

Terms in Italics are defined in the glossary.

Cost of Stroke to the United States

• total cost of stroke to the United States: estimated at about $43 billion / year

• direct costs for medical care and therapy: estimated at about $28 billion / year

• indirect costs from lost productivity and other factors: estimated at about $15 million / year

• average cost of care for a patient up to 90 days after a stroke: $15,000*

• for 10% of patients, cost of care for the first 90 days after a stroke: $35,000*

• percentage of direct cost of care for the first 90 days*:

initial hospitalization = 43%
rehabilitation = 16%
physician costs = 14%
hospital readmission = 14%
medications and other expenses = 13%

* From "The Stroke/Brain Attack Reporter's Handbook," National Stroke Association, Englewood, CO, 1997