Description:
Objectives: to show the profile epidemiological of patients with cerebral vascular accident in a public hospital from João Pessoa city, Paraíba, Brazil; to investigate the social demographic profile; to identify the risk factors, symptoms and sequels of the cerebral vascular accident. Methods: this is about a descriptive and exploratory study, from quantitative approach; the population was configured by sixty handbooks. Data collect was performed with a form from March to April 2007, and then data were analyzed and presented in tables and figures. This study was approval by the Ethics Committee under protocol number 58/2007. Results: data has been demonstrated that most of the handbooks belonged to patients from 46 to 85 years old; from female; they came from Mata Paraibana region; they were patients with hypertension; they had cerebral vascular accident of the type hemorrhagic. Conclusion: this study was very important for nurses, since it allowed them to have knowledge to help reduce the number of deaths and sequelae of cerebral vascular accident, also contributed to the basics to change like this, as knowledge of the disease and fitness treatment methods (among them, stand out studies of risk factors and relevance of applying an early prevention of cerebral vascular accident). Thus, the role of nursing is to prevent and detect early complications, educating the population about the disease. Descriptors: accident vascular cerebral; health profile; patient.