NIMAST was the brainchild of Michael Power and Sandra Aitcheson while they worked together at the Ulster Hospital Stroke Unit in the mid to late 1990's.
Northern Ireland has historically led the way in stroke service development across the UK. Stroke was a rapidly developing area and they felt there was a need for some method of networking and sharing ideas and best practice about stroke for professionals across N.I.
The first exploratory meeting was held in 1999 and attended by a large number of multi professional interested staff from all parts of Northern Ireland. At this meeting it was unanimously agreed that we should form a regional multi professional organisation for stroke that would be called NIMAST (Northern Ireland Multidisciplinary Association for Stroke Teams). Since those early beginnings NIMAST has developed into a thriving regional organisation running annual educational meetings and more recently collaborating with the UK Stroke Forum to have a more substantial stroke conference in Northern Ireland each year.
NIMAST has been instrumental in pushing forward the need for stroke guidelines, stroke education and the stroke strategy which was published in 2008. This has had a very positive impact on the quality of stroke services throughout N.I. NIMAST was a key to enabling this to happen. NIMAST has also had a strong advocacy role when it come to stroke in Northern Ireland and has lobbied the Minister for Health and the Chief Medical Officer on numerous occasions in order to highlight key important issues. NIMAST works closely with voluntary groups such as Northern Ireland Chest, Heart and Stroke, The Stroke Association and more recently Stroke Association in Northern Ireland.
NIMAST has been widely viewed in other parts of the UK as an exemplar for how stroke teams could organise themselves regionally as a network. From the original NIMAST group we now have NIMAST representation in Nursing, Physiotheraphy, Speech and Language Therapy and Occupational Therapy. They each in their own way have had a strong impact on their own Uni-professional groups but the core thrust of what NIMAST does continues to be multidisciplinary and champion the importance of the work of stroke teams throughout Northern Ireland.
These achievements have come about through the hard work and dedication of the many people who are committed to continuing its work.
It is a great privilege to have been appointed to the role of NIMAST chair. I would firstly like to thank my predecessor Sandra Aitcheson and the committee for their work over the last two years but also take time to recognise the contribution off all NIMAST members from its original launch 14 years ago.
One of the fundamental aims of NIMAST is to promote quality stroke care but also to ensure continuing education and stroke development within our respective units. The annual stroke conference is crucial to fulfilling some of that requirement. This is now the second year of collaboration between NIMAST and the UK stroke forum. I would like to thank the event committee in bringing together a diverse program covering a multitude of stroke specific topics.
I wish to thank all contributors to this newsletter. In the build up to the conference we asked through the NIMAST membership for submissions on various aspects of stroke care. The topics vary from hyper-acute care to rehabilitation to service user involvement. It continuously amazes me as to what is actually happening locally and yet we are often completely unaware. We would welcome any submissions for our Autumn/Winter newsletter and indeed encourage local abstract submissions for the 2014 conference.
The Belfast Trust Neuropsychology service continues to develop psychological care across the care pathway from acute to community. One area of focus is the on-going screening for mood and cognition. It is anticipated that as the pathway changes, with the acute stroke service consolidated on the Royal Victoria Hospital site from...
Congratulations to Hilary Thompson Stroke Specialist Nurse Southern Trust who has been short-listed for the RCN Nurse of the year (technology award). Finals are to be held in June 2013. It will be a busy summer for Hilary as she is to attend the Kings Fund International Telehealth and Telecare Congress Conference in London this July, to...
1. Currently we are trying to get an out of hour thrombolysis rota organised for AAH and Causeway. This has proven difficult due to general medical rota implications who would be on both. This will also help with weekend TIA referrals. There has been opportunities to address this through the regional thrombolysis work-stream and...
It is a great privilege to have been appointed to the role of NIMAST chair. I would firstly like to thank my predecessor Sandra Aitcheson and the committee for their work over the last two years but also take time to recognise the contribution off all NIMAST members from its original launch 14 years ago.
One of the fundamental aims of...
The Southern HSC Trust is currently working in conjunction with the Northern Periphery Programme of ITTS (Implementing Transnational Telemedicine Solutions) to develop SLT Services to Community stroke clients in the Newry and Mourne locality. www.transnational-telemedicine.eu
On discharge from hospital, access...
