This legislation builds off of years of legislative efforts to improve the system of how stroke patients are transported to treatment facilities. In the FY2024 state budget, a provision was included that requires the Massachusetts Department of Health (DPH) to “tier” hospitals based on stroke treatment capability and requires DPH to issue pre-hospital protocols for patients to be directly transported to comprehensive stroke centers, bypassing any closer community hospitals.

There are only a handful of such comprehensive stroke centers in the commonwealth. The language, which is several decades old, does not include any of the other 2019 DPH recommendations to ensure proper assessment on stroke severity. This bill would also require DPH to collect and report data that will be used to make improvements in the system to better efficiency and save more lives.