Researchers from the Wrocław University of Science and Technology, in collaboration with neurosurgeons, are investigating whether it is possible to use knowledge of the weather to predict the risk of strokes or heart attacks.
It is a common belief among doctors caring for patients with vascular diseases that they will have more work to do on patients with strokes or heart attacks a few days after a weather collapse or the passage of a weather front.
“We have already started analysis on a very large scale. Thanks to our cooperation with the National Health Fund, we have gained access to a database of so-called ‘vascular incidents’ over a two-year period”, says Dr Artur Kwiatkowski, neurosurgeon at the Provincial Specialist Hospital in Legnica.
Mathematicians and specialists in machine learning and numerical modelling from the Wrocław University of Science and Technology are now studying the data. They are looking for links between weather conditions and the number of patients presenting to hospitals with, for example, a stroke or heart attack.
