Sep 13, 2022
Dr Carina Persson (Sweden) will be chairing this first session on going back to work after a stroke.
This important goal may seem impossible. Yet, in spite of impairments, a return to professional work is possible. This session provides practical help on doing this.
Carina will be joined by stroke survivor Anders Andersson (Sweden), Professor of Rehabilitation Research, Kate Radford (England) and Katharina Stibrant Sunnerhagen, Professor of Rehabilitation Medicine (Sweden)
Join us and you will learn from the latest research and a stroke survivor´s experiences.’
Carina Persson
Book your Free place at https://bit.ly/3daJuMQ
Sep 8, 2022
Our second free online event of 2022 on Wednesday 9 November is now open for registration.
We are pleased to bring to you three exciting sessions focussing on key issues faced by people living with stroke: getting back to work; fatigue and getting active. Chaired by Dr Carina Persson (Sweden), Professor Avril Drummond (England), and Juliet Bouverie (England) respectively. Each session will include a mix of presentations from stroke survivors and academically active speakers in the field of life after stroke.
There are many issues for people after a stroke including getting back to a good quality of life that is worth living. Here, the European Life After Stroke Forum event in November will focus on three areas that are really important to help those living with stroke get their lives back on track. These sessions will cover a mix of research and evidence, contributions from health practitioners as well as hearing from stroke survivors who will share their personal experiences. This event is for anyone with an interest in life after stroke and keen to improve services and care post stroke and rehabilitation.
SAFE Director General, Arlene Wilkie
We are currently seeking accreditation for this event from the European Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education.
Book your place at https://bit.ly/3BSVPQc
If you missed our other events in the Live After Stroke Series, you can now catch up on demand at elasf.org
Sep 8, 2022
The World Stroke Academy is running a free webinar with international experts about stroke in women on 16 September 2022, 17.00 CET.
The session will focus on atrial fibrillation, stroke prevention and stroke in pregnancy and post childbirth.
AF and Stroke in Women – Dr Marialuisa Zedde (Italy)
Stroke Prevention in Women – Professor Ana Catarina Fonseca (Portugal)
Stroke in Pregnancy and Puerperium – Professor Anita Arsovska (North Macedonia)
The webinar is for everyone who is interested in learning more about this topic.
Book your place here
Sep 5, 2022
We welcomed three new SAFE Board members at our General Assembly meeting on 17 June 2022.
Jan Konig (Czech Republic), Dorina Dobreva (Bulgaria) and Marianne Tangen (Norway) applied for the roles and were voted in by our members.
Find out from Jan what motivated him to apply and what he would like to achieve in this role youtu.be/VmmPfFVQyI4
The assembly re-elected Chris Macey (Ireland) who will retain his role as Treasurer and Marina Charalambous (Cyprus) who will retain her role as Secretary.
The SAFE board has appointed two new honorary members – Grethe Lunde (Norway) and Jon Barrick (UK), as a thank you to all the hard work and support they have given to SAFE during their time on the Board.
Other motions approved were the:
- Minutes of General Assembly June 2021
- 2021 Annual Accounts and the 2022 Budget
- New power of attorney
- Removal of France AVC as a member of SAFE
Our member’s meeting – held on the same day – brought together more than 50 representatives from stroke support organisations in 25 countries. This was our first face to face meeting in over two years. The meeting gave us the opportunity to tell our members about our work, our achievements and involve them in developing our future strategy.
We welcomed special guests representing local member Fundacio Ictus, who celebrated their 15-year anniversary, and Professor Avril Drummond, Chair of the European Life After Stroke Forum Scientific Committee. Our President Harriet Proios gave an update on the award-winning Fast Heroes – saving the world one grandparent at a time – campaign.
Aug 2, 2022
The European Federation of Neurological Associations (EFNA) has launched a new eLearning course on Communications for Patient Advocacy.
The series is divided into three modules – Communicating with impact, Communicating persuasively and Presentation skills for public speaking.
The course is the latest in EFNA’s Training Initiatives for Neurology Advocates programme. It is free, though registration is required. It is available in English, but subtitles in other languages can be enabled.
Learn more and register at www.efna.net/elearning
Aug 2, 2022
The Essentials of Stroke Care guide is for healthcare professionals to support them improve stroke treatment and care and to help implement the Stroke Action Plan for Europe.
It contains an overview of evidence-based interventions and the minimum standards of care a stroke survivor should expect through their entire chain of care including the pre-hospital, acute hospital stay, rehabilitation and life after stroke.
Listen to Professor Thorsten, from the European Stroke Organisation, talk about why he created this guide as part of the Stroke Action Plan for Europe, read the Essentials of Stroke Care or find out more about the Stroke Action Plan for Europe
Jul 26, 2022
The European Commission recently launched the EU Non-Communicable Diseases Initiative – Healthier Together to reduce the burden of non-communicable diseases (NCD), including stroke, and improve health and wellbeing.
From December 2021 to May 2022, SAFE and the European Stroke Organisation (ESO) worked closely together with DG Sante – the EU Commission department responsible for their policies on health and food safety – in the co-creation process for the EU NCD initiative.
This has resulted in the publication of a toolkit to guide Member states and EU policymakers towards a holistic and coordinated approach for health promotion and disease prevention, treatment and care, for diseases including stroke.
The plan covers the period from 2022-2027 and prioritises four disease groups including diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, chronic respiratory diseases, mental health and neurological disorders and health determinants for all major NCDs. Recognising its significant health burden and opportunities for improvement, we are delighted to see that stroke is specifically drawn out as a priority area under mental health and neurological disorders.
The initiative underlines the vital importance of implementing a national stroke plan, increasing public awareness, and improving screening, encompassing the entire chain of care from primary prevention to life after stroke.
This builds on the Stroke Action Plan for Europe 2018-2030, developed by SAFE in collaboration with the European Stroke Organisation.
We look forward to working with DG Sante and the European Commission in implementing the initiative to improve stroke prevention, care and life after stroke for all affected by stroke in Europe.
The full report can be found here: https://t.co/Iofn3e46NW
Harriet Proios, SAFE President, added:
We welcome this response by the European Commission to the ongoing efforts of the health community to prioritise non-communicable diseases (NCDs) on the EU agenda. We worked together with the European Stroke Organisation on a joint response to the consultation which was based on the Stroke Action Plan for Europe and the Essentials of Stroke care guideline.
We are delighted that stroke is drawn out as a priority area and that the Stroke Action Plan will be implemented across Europe. This initiative gives us an ideal opportunity to raise the profile of stroke within our countries and we hope it will contribute to reducing the stroke burden, and improve the quality of life of those living with stroke in Europe.
Jun 7, 2022
If you missed our virtual event in March, you can now watch both plenaries at your leisure at our European Life After Stroke website www.elasf.org https://www.elasf.org/resource-centre/
Our next event will be on 9 November 2022. For the latest updates and more information on our Life After Stroke series, sign up to our enewsletter
Thank you for the excellent presentations including stroke survivors stories/experiences. I will definitely be aiming to embed some of these thoughts into my practise to empower my patients to be equipped for self-management in order to give them quality of life as stroke survivors.
Event participant, Plenary 1, Life After Stroke: Be inspired and share control – the added value of self-management
Thank you so much for such an interesting presentation. It was particularly interesting to hear from ‘expert witnesses’ and real- life experience of challenges and coping strategies.
Event participant, Plenary 2, Life after stroke: Communication in everyday life
Jun 7, 2022
We had a successful face-to-face presence at the European Stroke Organisation Conference 2022 – the first since the start of the pandemic.
Some of the highlights include:
- A Stroke Action Plan for Europe (SAP-E) workshop where Arlene Wilkie, presented alongside Hanne Christensen (Denmark) and Bo Norving (Sweden). Romania shared their experiences of improving stroke care and Ukraine, Portugal, Italy and Armenia shared their successes to date.
- SAFE President, Harriet Proios, as well as presenting SAP-E awards to Bulgaria, Estonia, Italy, Germany, Greece and Serbia, for their work in promoting SAP-E, spoke of the importance of SAP-E in improving stroke care for stroke survivors.
- Harriet gave a moving presentation on the FAST Heroes initiative, Saving the World One Grandparent at a Time, demonstrating the impact successful educational and prevention campaigns can have.
- Rubina Ahmed, SAFE Board member from the Stroke Association, UK, took part in a panel interview on the patient perspective and how to involve stroke survivors in research.
May 31, 2022
Stroke is one of the leading causes of death and disability in Europe.
Many strokes can be prevented, treated, and managed.
Learn more about the Stroke Action Plan for Europe targets and roadmap in the Action Plan document
