[1] On this day, organizations around the world have facilitated events emphasizing education, testing, and initiatives to improve the damaging effects of stroke worldwide.
[2] The WSO now has an ongoing campaign that serves as a year-round interface for advocacy, policy, and outreach to support strides and continue progress made on World Stroke Day.
The World Stroke Campaign's goodwill ambassadors include Indian Cricketer Sunil Gavaskar,[3] former Miss Egypt Dalia El Behery[4] and cyclist Alberto Contador.
[8] Under the direction of Dr. Vladimir Hachinski, a working group was formed, which was incorporated into a World Stroke Proclamation in October 2006.
[8] The 2009 winner was the National Stroke Association of Sri Lanka, which organized a series of media conferences, promotional materials, and training programs.
[19][20] In the United States, the American Heart Association developed the My-Life Check online health assessment in cooperation with World Stroke Organization.
World Stroke Day 2011 received increased response in the media with coverage in English, Spanish, Portuguese, Arabic, Chinese, and many other languages.
[21] Additionally, players from Brazilian football clubs Ceará and Flu wore shirts and carried signs, in a match attended by President Vargas, in support of stroke awareness.
It also celebrated the contributions of care givers, who are the conduits between the stroke community and the public, as well as an important channel for disseminating correct information.
In Sri Lanka, a musical group FLAME held a concert to celebrate World Stroke Day.
Numerous other activities also took place around the world in a joint effort to raise stroke awareness and improve care quality[citation needed].
Gender-specific risk factors include pregnancy and a variety of associated conditions such as preeclampsia, other pregnancy-related hypertensive disorders, and gestational diabetes.
This year saw 141 event registrations from 190 countries and created 12.9 billion opportunities to read World Stroke Day related articles online.
It was agreed to provide more support with member advocacy and to move to an annual instead of a biennial World Stroke Day theme.
Each year the campaign would focus on a different part of the care continuum covering recognition and treatment, prevention and life after stroke.
The campaign called on everyone - individuals, families, communities, health professionals and governments to join the fight against stroke.
The campaign in 2017 broke all WSO records in terms of recorded engagement and reach with 208 events being registered in 62 countries, over 10,000 document downloads (brochure, poster, infographic, web banner, news release) a 110,000 Facebook reach on World Stroke Day and 20,000 views of campaign video on Facebook and YouTube channels.
Through advances in research, and communications at the international level, WSC strives to promote advocacy towards making stroke less of a global threat.