AHA Deputy Chief Science and Medical Officer, Rose Marie Robertson, M.D., FAHA, offers perspective (via Zoom) on ISC 20 presentation WMP111. copyright American Heart Association "It's really important that we figure out why this is. The kind of study that this abstract represents is data gathered from looking at these very carefully done surveys where patients are interviewed and we get good information from them in a careful way but it doesn't address why they did or didn't stop smoking. Patients who've had a stroke have a lot to think about. They have to think about their rehabilitation from the stroke. They have to think about other medications that they take, blood thinners, antiplatelet agents or anticoagulants, medications to lower their cholesterol, medications to lower their blood pressure. So all of those things are being dealt with either with their health care provider, hopefully, supported by rehabilitation programs. We know that not enough people are referred to rehab programs, so that's a potential gap. So it could be that they're distracted from other things by all these other measures and prevention that they need to undertake, but I don't think we have really a good answer. So further research into why we haven't seen a change is gonna be important."