Implementation of Stroke Center in Korea

초록

Since the success of recent pivotal endovascular trials, stroke triage of relevant patient to thrombectomy capable hospital is becoming more important. In this context, prehospital stroke screening is evolving to discriminate large vessel occlusion from the others. Developmental history and characteristics of each prehospital stroke scale will be discussed. Korean Stroke Society will soon conduct EMS education program to disseminate prehospital stroke screen. Drip-and-ship model vs. Mother ship model of stroke organization depends on the regional characteristics of population. In Korea, most population is concentrated in metropolitan area, and many stroke centers are serving comprehensive stroke cares in the urban area. But in mountain and islands area, there are still shortage of even primary stroke centers. To ameliorate this regional difference and establish control tower of stroke network, Korean government launched Regional Cerebrovascular Center program since 2009 and up to now 14 centers have been designated. Performance and outcome index of these centers will be presented. But these centers are not sufficient to cover nationwide stroke patients. To overcome this gap and finally establish stroke safety network, Korean Stroke Society launched Stroke Unit Certification program since 2009 and expanded this program to Stroke Center and Strokeologist Certification program this year. Criteria of certification will be briefly summarized.