By proving that a particular stroke treatment was cost-effective, Imperial researchers have had significant impact on patient outcomes.
For people with disabling strokes resulting from blood clots in brain arteries, mechanical thrombectomy (MT) has proven to be an effective new treatment. However, the cost prevented it from being widely adopted in the UK.
Professor Kyriakos Lobotesis (Department of Brain Sciences) led an analysis that showed the costs of MT combined with standard treatment were offset by substantial long-term savings. This estimated saving of £33,190 per patient was due to improved health outcomes and reduced hospital stays and long-term care costs.
This result underpinned the UK’s National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) policy recommendations supporting MT as a treatment for patients. In just one year between April 2019 and March 2020, 1,607 patients were treated by MT in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, with 70.3% experiencing improvement in their clinical outcome.
