We describe new findings from the implementation of an educational school-based stroke awareness programme, FAST (Face, Arm, Speech, Time) 112 Heroes, that teaches kindergarten children about stroke symptomatology and the appropriate action plan. The goal of our study was to examine whether the population mostly affected by stroke, i.e. the elderly, can be educated by young children, who have attended the programme. The educational programme was implemented face-to-face in a kindergarten in Athens, Greece, once a week for five consecutive weeks for one hour per week. Preschoolers (n = 137, aged 4.1-7, mean age=5.3) were enrolled in the programme and nominated two elderly members of their extended family (grandparents) as their own superheroes. Family members received personalized stroke-related material. Stroke awareness of the grandparents was measured before programme implementation (phase 1), after (prior to receiving the printed personalized stroke-related material, phase 2) and three months after receiving the printed personalized stroke-related material (phase 3). Data was obtained from 63 grandparents (48 women; aged 60-84, mean age=69.5 years). Family members demonstrated significant increases in stroke symptom knowledge (p < 0.001) and appropriate course of action (p ≤ 0.001) after participating in the program (phase 2) and receiving printed personalized stroke-related material (phase 3). The majority of the participants (86.84%) reported positive feedback about the received material, the programme, and their interaction with their grandchildren during the programme. Elderly family members outside the nuclear family can be successfully educated about stroke through their grandchildren and the FAST 112 Heroes programme.

Background: Stroke is a worldwide leading cause of disability, and around 50 million people are affected by stroke annually. Public stroke educational and awareness programmes can make a great deal of difference. Young children are in key position to seek urgent medical care if grandparents suffer a stroke, as grandparents are often their secondary caretakers. Objective: The objective of the current study was to design an educational intervention targeting children and, in parallel, directly involve extended family members. Design: Participatory action research. Setting: School-based education stroke intervention in Thessaloniki, Northern Greece. Methods: Over the course of 5 weeks, this intervention sought to educate 66 preschool children and their families through a series of novel activities that revolved around 4 superheroes, the FAST mnemonic and a medical emergency number. One superhero and their unique superpower was introduced every week through a Powerpoint presentation, a short animation video and a wide range of in-class and take-home activities, such as ‘phantom speech’, role-playing, funny face mimicking games, and rhyming poems. Children were also encouraged to identify their own family superhero so as to transfer their learning to real life. Results: Follow-up individual and group assessment pointed to encouraging results. Results from odd-one-out-tasks revealed that children were able to recognise the stroke symptoms in question. However, they performed more poorly on more complex tasks involving recall. Conclusions: Preschool children acquired knowledge of stroke symptoms which appears more solid when recognition is assessed. Assessment tasks involving substantial recall of information do not necessarily reflect the ability to detect stroke symptoms.

FAST (Face, Arm, Speech, Time) 112 Heroes is an educational programme that delivers information to children and their extended families helping them identify the principal signs of stroke and informing them how to respond appropriately in the event of a stroke. To examine the baseline stroke literacy that extended families possess, as well as to assess whether children enrolled in FAST 112 Heroes programme effectively convey stroke knowledge to their extended family. Field trial. Four schools in Northern Greece – two public and two private. Parents of preschool aged (5–7 years) children completed stroke knowledge questionnaires, before the programme began and one week after the completion of the FAST 112 Heroes programme. Findings were analysed. In total, 240 parents of kindergarten children (146 women, 94 men; 20–59 years old; mean age: 38.81) completed the pre-programme questionnaire, whereas only 80 of them (33.33%) completed the post-programme questionnaire. Before the programme started, 30 out of 80 parents (37.5%) recognised the three rudimentary stroke symptoms, compared to 68 out of 80 (85%) after the completion of the programme (p = .00). Parental awareness of the emergency number 112 and of the FAST acronym before programme implementation was relatively poor. Improvement of stroke knowledge post-implementation was observed in the extended family of preschool children enrolled in the FAST 112 Heroes programme which suggests that the latter delivered stroke information to their families effectively.

Objective: In the present study, we explored numerical problems in individuals with aphasia. We investigate whether numerical deficits, usually accompanying aphasia, can be observed on number comprehension tasks that do not necessarily require an oral response.Method: Individuals with aphasia were classified into anterior, posterior, and global subgroups according to the lesion type. To investigate numerical cognition, we used a relatively recent tool, the Numerical Activities of Daily Living (NADL).Results: The results showed that individuals with aphasia have problems with tasks of basic number comprehension as well as in most NADL. In the formal part of the NADL, anterior aphasic patients made comparatively more errors than the posterior aphasic patients. Global aphasic patients presented an invariably poor performance on almost all tasks.Conclusion: The results provide insight into how numerical deficits may impair an individual with aphasia in activities of daily living. This study is a preliminary attempt to start the validation process of the NADL for the Greek population.

In this work we present the results of the implementation of a globally representative educational school-based stroke awareness programme, FAST (Face, Arm, Speech, Time) Heroes during the second year of education (wave 2). We aimed to observe changes in baseline stroke knowledge between wave 1 and wave 2, distinguish the more fine-grained effect of the campaign on society, and evaluate changes before and after the implementation of wave 2. In wave 2, parents of school-aged children completed an online stroke preparedness questionnaire before (t1) and after (t2) programme implementation. Results between the time points were analyzed with descriptive statistics alongside changes in baseline knowledge between waves 1 and 2. 1,611 parents participated in wave 2. Parents increased their knowledge of three stroke symptoms from 69% to 87% (p<.001). Their knowledge of the designated emergency number rose from 75% (t1) to 88% (t2) (p<.001). A 17% increase in baseline knowledge occurred in stroke symptoms identified correctly between wave 1 (11 countries) and 2 (18 countries). Results support the precision and usability of the data collection approach in measuring the change in stroke knowledge between implementation waves. The increased baseline knowledge concerning stroke symptoms in wave 2 needs further examination.