Management of acute stroke in the elderly: preliminary results of a controlled trial.

A randomised controlled trial compared the management of elderly patients with acute stroke in a stroke unit and medical units. A significantly higher proportion of patients discharged from the stroke unit (78 of the 155 admitted) were assessed as independent compared with patients discharged from medical units (49 of the 152 admitted). The intensive use of treatment that might have been implied by creating a stroke unit did not occur, although almost all the patients admitted to the unit received occupational therapy while only 47% of the patients admitted to medical units received occupational therapy. The delay before starting treatment was significantly shorter in the stroke unit. Results of this trial show that the stroke unit improved the natural history of stroke by increasing the proportion of patients who were returned to functional independence.