The Irish Heart Foundation says inadequate health services are causing at least one death each day from stroke.

The charity’s launched a new campaign help raise awareness of stroke prevention methods.

It says the 11 dedicated units in Ireland are simply unable to cope with patient demand.

Director Dr. Brian Maurer insists that improving services wouldn’t cost a great deal.

“I don’t believe we need an enormous amount of money to start with” he said.

“What I would like to do is to have the stroke policy put on the agenda for the prevention of disease and then I would ask the HSE to find the resources necessary to do it”.

“If you want to put a figure on it, it’d be a drop in the ocean compared to the health budget of €15 billion a year” he added.