Glossary

• Cardiovascular disease

  Disease of the heart and/or blood vessels. 

• Care pathway

  A tool used by healthcare professionals to define the sequence and timings of a set of tasks or interventions that should be performed for a patient who enters a healthcare setting (e.g. a hospital) with a specific problem. 

• Carotid angioplasty

  A surgical procedure that widens the internal diameter of the carotid artery, after it has been narrowed by atherosclerosis. 

• Carotid arteries

  Main blood vessels in the neck, which supply oxygenated blood to the brain. 

• Carotid endarterectomy (CEA)

  A surgical procedure used to clear the inside of the carotid artery of atheroma. 

• Carotid stenosis

  The narrowing of the carotid arteries in the neck. 

• Carotid stenting

  Insertion of a tube into the carotid artery in order to prop the artery open and reduce narrowing. 

• Caval filter

  A device that is inserted into the veins to prevent a blood clot entering the lungs. 

• Cerebral venous thrombosis

  A blood clot that forms within a vein inside the brain. 

• Clinician

  A registered healthcare professional such as a doctor, nurse or therapist. 

• Cochrane review

  A systematic review of research in health care and health policy that is published in the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews. 

• Commissioner (health services)

  Person or organisation in some parts of the UK National Health Service (NHS) that decides how to allocate the health budget for a service. 

• Community stroke team, community stroke rehabilitation team

  A stroke specialist multidisciplinary team that provides stroke rehabilitation for patients in their own home or other community setting (including care homes and nursing homes). This may be following hospital discharge, after a patient has been discharged from an early supported discharge team or at any point post stroke where rehabilitation needs are identified. The intensity and duration of this service should be determined by patient need.

• Compensatory strategies

  Learning an alternative way of completing a task. 

• Computed tomography (CT)

  An X-ray technique used to examine the brain. 

• Confidence interval (CI)

  When analysing a research study, this is the range (‘interval’) of possible results that statisticians are 95% confident the actual result lies between. 

• Constraint-induced movement therapy

  Therapy that involves preventing the use of the unaffected side of the body thus forcing the use of the affected side. 

• Cost-effectiveness

  The extent to which the benefits of a treatment outweigh the costs.