The Stroke Health Integration Team (HIT) brings together clinicians, commissioners, academics, care and support providers and other experts, as well as people who have had strokes and their families and carers. We are committed to preventing strokes and improving the lives of people affected by stroke through working together beyond the limits of individual organisations, in Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire (BNSSG).
Local stroke prevention, treatment and care services need to be improved and to be more accountable to local patients, carers and the public.
Over 1,300 people have strokes in BNSSG each year and now the quality of treatment and care they receive depends on where they live.
We have influenced the redesign of BNSSG's stroke care pathway, which will take account of national research that shows better outcomes for people who have strokes when they receive 'immediate' care at a single specialised 'hyperacute' unit, followed by recovery and rehabilitation through properly integrated care systems that link hospitals with the community.
The new stroke service will ensure that people have continuity and equal access to care wherever they live.
Latest news and events
3 March 2022
One in 50 people in Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire live with the long-term effects of stroke. Chris Priestman, Stephen Hill and Claire Angell are three stroke survivors from Bristol Health Partners’ Stroke Health Integration Team (HI...
1 February 2022
Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) has today, Tuesday 1 February, agreed a series of recommendations to reorganise and improve the area’s stroke services. Dr Chris Burton, Clinical Lead for the progra...
28 January 2022
Our team welcomed two new members at the end of 2021 and start of 2022 as Connie Shiridzinomwa and Heidi Andrews joined as Senior Project Managers. Heidi is with us two days per week, working with the Sexual Health Improvement Programme and Kidney Dise...
25 January 2022
A series of recommendations to improve stroke services in Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire will be presented for decision next week.Recommendations to improve emergency stroke care, ongoing hospital treatment, and rehabilitation will be p...
19 October 2021
An artist whose life was profoundly affected by a stroke has captured its impacts in a new exhibition.Hazel Hammond has been a poet and an artist for over 40 years. She had a stroke in 2018 and now lives with aphasia, a changing condition affecting over 3...
14 October 2021
Bristol Health Partners held its annual Conference on Tuesday 12 October 2021. Like last year, the event was held online due to the ongoing pandemic, with more than 110 academics, clinicians, commissioners and others from organisations across Bristol, Sou...
20 July 2021
Dr Phil Clatworthy, Sara Blackmore, Dr Phil Simons, Chris Priestman and Stephen Hill reflect on the 2019-20 achievements of the Stroke Health Integration Team (Stroke HIT). Over the past year continued effort from Stroke HIT directors, public contribut...
8 July 2021
Aspirin can reduce the risk of serious cardiovascular events such as ischemic stroke and heart attack in patients with pneumonia, according to new research.Serious cardiovascular complications are common in cases of pneumonia and are strongly associated w...
8 June 2021
Proposals to change the way hospital stroke services are organised and delivered in Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire will be put to the public from 7 June, after the local Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) made the decision to progress t...
8 June 2021
Delays in discharging older people living with frailty from hospital are caused by a complex range of factors, but a key factor is how medical and social information about patients becomes fragmented during their stay. This is the conclusion of a study in...
25 May 2021
Bristol Health Partners’ Stroke Health Integration Team (HIT) has received funding to create a scalable database of routinely collected NHS stroke clinical and imaging data. This resource, funded by a health data science grant from the University of Bri...
23 March 2021
Like with many things, the COVID-19 pandemic has meant that many services and groups have had to adapt and change how they work. With in-person events postponed indefinitely, the Stroke Odysseys team needed to find a new way for people who have had...
