[Frequent ethical issues encountered in stroke care].

We review some of the most frequent ethical issues encountered in stroke care. Priorities in stroke care should be based on the principles of the Swedish prioritization platform: human dignity, needs/solidarity, and cost-effectiveness. The prognosis is often uncertain very early after stroke.

Self-rated health over the first five years after stroke.

Background: Self-rated health (SRH) focuses on the patient's own perception, and represents an important patient-reported outcome. The aim was to investigate SRH one to 5 years after stroke, follow the development over time and search for factors associated with SRH.

Methods: Consecutive stroke patients admitted to Stroke Units at the Skaraborg Hospital, Sweden were included 2007-2009 (n = 2190).

Changes in functional outcome over five years after stroke.

Objectives: Data on the long-term time course of poststroke functional outcome is limited. We investigated changes in functional outcome over 5 years after stroke in a hospital based cohort.

Materials And Methods: Consecutive patients who were independent in activities of daily living (ADL) and admitted to a Stroke Unit at Skaraborg Hospital, Sweden for a first acute stroke from 2007 to 2009 (n = 1,421) were followed-up after 3 months and thereafter annually over 5 years using a postal questionnaire.