[Interdisciplinary networking for optimal treatment decision-making : Fast decision-making in acute ischemic stroke...

Every year, about 270,000 strokes occur in Germany. In the entire DACH region (Germany, Austria, Switzerland), more than 310,000 cases are reported each year. Two thirds of the surviving patients are dependent on external assistance after the stroke. Increasingly, imaging data are becoming the focus of treatment decisions. These data provide critical information about the location and extent of vessel occlusion, infarct size, volume of salvageable brain tissue, and degree of collateralization. Certified stroke units and stroke networks already specialize in state-of-the-art therapeutic options, but they need additional information technology tools to deliver the right therapy to the right patient population as quickly as possible. For multidisciplinary, seamless support in stroke care, both prehospital and in-hospital processes need to be optimized. This article presents a concept for supraregional stroke care by means of networking all involved actors in the prehospital as well as in the in-hospital area. Further needs analyses should ensure the implementation as well as the generalizability to different regions.