Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy very much for his support for the stroke strategy. I think we can agree that our healthcare professionals are making important progress on behalf of patients and families. As a result of the work over the last ten years, deaths from the most common form of stroke have fallen by nearly 30%, which is very welcome. The average length of stay for patients has fallen a lot as well, from 11 days in hospital to eight. The proportion of patients being seen by a medical team within ten minutes of arriving at a hospital has more than doubled. I know the Deputy will join me in acknowledging the huge efforts of our healthcare professionals to put these responses in place.

The stroke strategy the Deputy referenced is from 2022 to 2027. It is a five-year strategy with aims around prevention, better outcomes and more after-stroke care. The predicted outcome of the new strategy is a reduction of about 1,000 strokes a year, so it is clearly very important. As the Deputy said, I approved the national stroke strategy last year and allocated in the budget for this year a significant amount of money, nearly €5 million, to support the implementation of the strategy. This included the recruitment of two consultant stroke physicians, a consultant neuroradiologist and senior speech and language therapists, with additional recruitment ongoing as well. Two new early supported discharge teams were established this year and six existing teams received increased staffing. A major FAST - face, arms, speech and time - awareness campaign has also been undertaken and I am sure we have all seen that.

Through next year, the amount of money being allocated will increase from €4.9 million to €7.3 million. To answer the Deputy's question directly, that is for the existing level of service. I expect the national stroke strategy will fully use up all that money. The next phase has a particular emphasis on the extension of the GP chronic disease management programme to include those with hypertension. There is funding in the budget for that as well.

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