Stroke Annual Conference a huge success

We were delighted to welcome over 130 people who attended our event in person, with over 50 more joining us via our live stream on YouTube. We heard from a range of speakers covering topics from across the care pathway including keynote addresses from national experts.

Consultant Therapist Dr Louise Johnson from the University of Southampton (pictured left) focused our thoughts on the intensity of neurorehabilitation (NR) and touched on the benefits of technology. Unfortunately, the train strike put pay to Dr David Hargroves (national stroke GiRFT lead) speaking in person but he kindly recorded his talk on hyper acute and pre-hospital care for us to play.

We had many other great presentations on topics such as blood pressure monitoring at home, 6 month reviews and virtual reality assisted rehabilitation. Nick Davis, our stroke Patient and Carer Group Chair, spoke movingly about the need for involvement in our work, with Madhura from the Stroke Association sharing early results from a listening project we have funded (more on this later).

Our poster competition was a huge success with prizes awarded to 4 different teams in the inpatient and community categories. The day ended with the presentation of the Tyrrell Award for outstanding contribution to stroke care in Greater Manchester. This year we made two awards (we skipped 2021 due to the pandemic) with Lorraine Azam (pictured left) and Paula Beech (pictured in the middle), both from Salford Royal stroke service receiving the accolade from the “grandmother of stroke” Professor Pippa Tyrrell (pictured right).