What it is
Certification is how Europe turns "a good stroke unit" from an opinion into a measurable standard.
The European Stroke Organisation (ESO) operates a programme that reviews stroke units and stroke centres against an explicit, published set of structural, process, and outcome criteria. A unit that meets them earns certification; a unit working toward them gets a concrete roadmap. Those criteria and their key performance indicators (KPIs) are set and published by ESO.
Why it matters
Stroke is time-critical and pathway-dependent: outcomes hinge on how a whole system behaves under pressure, not on any single clinician. Certification makes that system legible — it defines what a unit must be able to do, how fast, and how reliably, and it gives patients, hospitals, and payers a common reference point. It is also the backbone of cross-border quality: a standard only means something if it means the same thing in every country.
EUROSTROKES' role
EUROSTROKES does not run ESO certification and is not part of the review process. What it offers units is certification-readiness support benchmarked strictly against ESO's published criteria — an honest read of where a unit stands, how its KPIs compare, and what closing the gap would take. How the founder's separate ESO role is kept apart from this commercial work is set out in How We Work.
Current status
- ESO certification criteria and KPI framework published and in active use across Europe
- EUROSTROKES benchmarking units' readiness against ESO's published criteria
- Practical readiness guidance to be expanded here over time