Acute Medicine | Neurology | Definition of stroke

Definition of Stroke
Session Overview
Description
This session defines and describes stroke using current guidelines. It also makes the distinction between stroke, transient ischaemic attack (TIA) and brain attack.

Learning Objectives
By the end of this session you will be able to:

• Recall the definition of stroke

Stroke is defined as:

...a clinical syndrome consisting of rapidly developing clinical signs of focal (or global in case of coma) disturbance of cerebral function lasting more than 24 hours or leading to death with no apparent cause other than a vascular origin. (Hatano, 1976).

When conducting epidemiological studies of cerebrovascular disease, consistency of diagnostic criteria is vital in order to compare results over time and in different parts of the world.