Stroke Medicine
The devastating impact of stroke disease is steadily being recognised. It is the most common cause of death and acquired adult neurological disability in the UK and consumes over 5% of NHS resources. Clear standards in stroke care have been established; NSF National Service Framework for Older People, Royal College of Physicians and in Scotland the National Clinical Guidelines and the Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network. This has been consolidated by the implementation of the Government’s National Stroke Strategy. To deliver good quality stroke care, exemplary training is required to meet such standards
Stroke Medicine training is open to trainees holding a medical specialty training number in Geriatric Medicine, Neurology, Rehabilitation Medicine, Cardiology, Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics or General (Internal) Medicine. Training is generally for one year and is designed around the needs of the trainee depending upon their parent specialty with the aim to develop physicians with the attributes to run a specialist stroke service. After satisfactory completion of training, trainees will be accredited with the subspecialty of Stroke Medicine on the GMC specialist register following the award of their parent specialty CCT.
Within the Yorkshire Deanery there are three Stroke Medicine programmes recognised by the JRCPTB for training; East Programme (Hull Royal Infirmary and York District General Hospital), Central Programme (incorporating Leeds General Infirmary, Chapel Allerton Hospital and St James University Hospital) and the West Programme (incorporating Huddersfield Royal and Calderdale Hospitals, Bradford Royal Infirmary and Airedale General Hospital). Each provides the infrastructure to deliver high quality training in cerebrovascular medicine; acute stroke, stroke rehabilitation, secondary prevention and service provision either within one centre or across sites. Although a relatively new specialty, we have had one successful trainee (prior to subspecialty recognition) and currently have two trainees in post on the East and Central programmes.