Stroke Rehabilitation for the Elderly

The Stroke Rehabilitation service is based around 12 public in-patient beds. The rehabilitation team strives to create a 24 hour, seven day therapy environment, focused on achieving goals agreed individually with each patient. The team pride themselves on comprehensive, seamless rehabilitation.   As patients progress, treatment in the unit is often extended to treatment in the home. Close links with community services ensure that everything that needs to be done for safe discharge is usually addressed before the patient is discharged.

Patients are assessed as required by our multi-disciplinary team of nurses, physiotherapists, occupational therapists, social workers, speech and language therapists, dietitian and clinical psychologist.  They work very closely together to tailor their treatment programmes to continuously meet the changing needs of individual patients.

Therapy services are provided Monday to Friday.  Patients who are able to cope can go home at weekends, with the agreement of their consultant.

To enhance the communication of the team, the stroke rehabilitation team is actually based in the rehabilitation unit itself.  A large treatment area is available adjacent to the bed bays.

Stroke patients are normally first admitted to an acute hospital via an A&E department.  When they come to the attention of a geriatrician, an estimate is made of their treatment requirements.  Patients who may require a longer period of rehabilitation (generally around three months) are often referred to The Royal Hospital Donnybrook (RHD).  Patients must be medically stable before they can be admitted to the RHD.

Patients stay on average around 70 days, with approximately 80% successfully discharged home.  Even where someone is unlikely to return home, rehabilitation can help to enhance their self-care skills or mobility in a nursing home.

Where a patient may be able to cope at home, the multi-disciplinary team will often undertake a pre-discharge home visit, either with or without the patient, to see how they cope in their own house.  This is an important opportunity for the patient to see what difficulties they may face and for families to address important questions.

Where a patient is unable to cope at home, the social work team will help to identify a suitable placement.

Once discharged, patients may be brought back to our Day Hospital, usually for one day a week, for further treatment and to monitor progress.

For further information on the stroke rehabilitation service, please contact:

Emer Kennedy, Clinical Nurse Manager, Stroke Rehabilitation, 01-4066698, strokerehab@rhd.ie