When you care for someone in the home, you must also manage that person's health care. This means choosing a good medical team, keeping costs down, arranging for medical appointments, and getting the best, least expensive medicines. It also means knowing what the insurance rules are and, most important, being an advocate (a supporter) for the person in your care.

Doctors and nurses can focus on physical diagnosis and may ignore the emotional aspects of care. Sometimes they have little time to consider the spiritual aspects of healing. Although you should consult with professionals about the levels of therapy and support needed for the person in your care, you do not have to accept what they suggest or order. Keep asking questions until you completely understand the diagnosis (what is wrong), treatment, and prognosis (likely outcome).

Who Makes Up the Stroke Health Care Team?

Very few survivors get better all by themselves. Surviving and then recovering from a stroke require many different people involved in a long chain of survival and recovery. There is no guarantee that a stroke survivor will get better as a result of the care provided by these professionals, but it can be safely said that very few survivors get better all by themselves.

There are four stages of care: acute, acute rehab, subacute rehab, and at-home rehab.

NOTE: Moving from one care team to another is often not well coordinated and this is where you, as caregiver, can be very helpful. Your survivor will do much better in the healthcare system when you communicate information from one team to another. There is a trend toward electronic record keeping, but it is not currently the norm and may not be for a decade. Generally what travels between facilities is a written chart, which is often illegible. Consider it part of your job as caregiver to give important information to those responsible at each facility. Although each facility will do its own assessment, it is important for you to communicate all that you know about your survivor's condition to each person in the new healthcare team.

For starters, make a hand-written or typed list of your survivor's deficits (physical, cognitive, speech) and medications, and provide it to each new facility or unit he or she is moved to. Save this list, if possible in your computer, and update it when necessary so that it's always current. Be sure to take the medication list or chart to every doctor's appointment.