Dear Editor,
As a registered nurse and the spouse of a stroke survivor, I have seen our healthcare system from both sides: professionally and personally. Nothing prepared me for how difficult it can be to access coordinated care after a stroke.
When my husband survived an ischemic stroke in October 2025, we were grateful for rapid emergency treatment. Like most families, we believed that discharge from the hospital — a regional comprehensive stroke center serving southern Vermont and New Hampshire — meant a recovery plan was in place. We assumed neurology follow-up, rehabilitation guidance, medication oversight and care coordination would naturally follow.
That assumption was wrong.
What I have learned from both my own experience and that of others is that for many stroke patients, the greatest barriers begin after they leave the hospital. Families may face unanswered calls, delayed specialist appointments, fragmented communication between providers, unclear responsibility for follow-up care, and missed opportunities during the most critical window for recovery. For stroke survivors, lost time can mean lost function, lost independence and preventable complications.
What many Medicare beneficiaries and caregivers do not know is that they have access to an independent advocacy resource when healthcare systems fail to respond. Acentra Health serves as the Beneficiary and Family Centered Care Quality Improvement Organization for Medicare in many regions. It can help patients and families with quality-of-care concerns, discharge appeals, service termination appeals and urgent advocacy when medically necessary care is not being appropriately addressed.
In my husband’s case, admission to the emergency department in a regional comprehensive stroke center did not translate into effective follow-up care. The critical window for recovery was spent on calls and messages that were mostly unanswered. Unfortunately, I wasn’t aware at the time of Acentra Health and its role in advocating for safe and effective healthcare.
These services exist to protect patients, but too many families never hear about them until months after opportunities for recovery have been lost.
As both a nurse and a caregiver, I believe patients deserve more than emergency intervention. They deserve continuity, accountability and a clear path forward after a stroke.
If you or someone you love is struggling to access follow-up care, rehabilitation services, specialist oversight or answers both during and after a hospitalization, know that you have rights — and you have options outside the healthcare system itself.
Stroke recovery should not depend on how hard a family can fight to be heard.
Susan Boyer
Weathersfield, Vt.
