BHRUT annual report 2009 - Barking Havering and Redbridge ...

Annual Report & Accounts 2009-2010
9
New developments
Stroke unit
Queen’s Hospital has been named as one of only eight
in London to become a Hyper-Acute Stroke Centre.
The new unit will be fully operational by Autumn this
year, providing specialist 24-hour care to patients
following a stroke. This will include rapid assessment,
CT scan and early treatment with clot-busting drugs if
they are needed.
Healthcare for London decided to establish three types
of stroke unit across the capital:
• Hyper acute units to provide the best diagnostic
and clinical care in the first 72 hours after a stroke
WHO Safety Checklist
Queen’s and King George Hospital are two of the very
first in the country to fully utilise the World Health
Organisation’s surgical safety checklist. The checklist
aims to reduce the number of possible complications
in operating theatres. Every single patient undergoing
an operation can now be confident that the checklist
is completed at every stage of the procedure to ensure
their safety and that they receive the best possible
care. The WHO checklist has also been successfully
adopted in other specialist areas outside of the
operating theatres, such as when investigations are
needed using advanced radiological procedures.
• Local stroke units where patients can be cared for
while they are still very ill and start the recovery
process
• A TIA service for people who have had a Transient
Ischaemic Attack (TIA), or ‘mini stroke’
Queen’s is one of only eight hospitals across the
capital to be chosen to provide all three.
The new unit should see clinical outcomes improve,
with disabilities caused by a stroke significantly
reduced.
The unit is one of only two centres in the country
offering patients a revolutionary robotic arm to help
restore their movement after a stroke. These
pioneering machines assist patients to repeat arm and
shoulder exercises many hundreds of times to give
them the best possible chance of recovery.
New developments