Imaging Acute Ischemic Stroke: Mapping Present and Future Clinical Practice.

Imaging is an increasingly key component of advances in stroke care. Its role in the success of multiple recently reported trials that have now driven new standards of practice highlights its expanding importance in acute stroke management. With significant gains already realized, routine practice only stands to benefit further from additional advances in imaging in the future. The degree to which imaging will impact stroke care, however, is uncertain and complex: multiple aspects of stroke research and its translation into updated practice contribute to it. In this article, a few of these critical issues and questions related to imaging and its potential, both present and future, to drive stroke care forward are addressed.