Shivankar Nair

Research

In New Zealand, stroke is the second leading cause of death and the main cause of adult disability. Approximately 70% of those survivors are left with disabilities that affect their quality of life. Māori and Pacific people are overrepresented in this patient group because they experience strokes at a younger age and are three times less likely to be living independently after a stroke than New Zealand Europeans.

The possibility of improving post-stroke repair using medicines is therefore an attractive strategy and increasing interest has been directed to the potential role that drugs can play in enhancing recovery. However, the ability of these pharmacological agents to influence stroke recovery in patients is not well understood and requires further investigation.

Understanding how patient and medication-related factors contribute to poorer functional status in specific minority communities may provide an opportunity to close the gap to improve long-term outcomes through better prescribing. Understanding the impact of these treatments on stroke recovery will become increasingly relevant to prescribing pharmacists in NZ who provide care for stroke patients as our population continues to age. Clear prescribing guidelines for stroke may enable clinicians and pharmacist to indirectly reduce the number of patients who live with severe stroke-related deficits and the long-term healthcare costs associated with supporting these patients.

The aim of my project is therefore to investigate the patient and medication related factors that influence long term functional status after stroke by obtaining linked data from National Minimum Dataset (NMDS), Pharmaceutical Collection (PC), InterRAI and the NZ thrombolysis register for all patients ever admitted to hospital with an ischaemic stroke in NZ.