摘要As a complicated cerebrovascular dis-order, ischemic stroke involves a series of mind-body connections. The "stress" refers to a state of threatened homeostasis caused by any form of internal or external disturbing forces. The "stress response" is a counter-acting force that neutralizes the effects of stressors and re-establish homeostasis, which may cause two different outcomes, the allostasis and allostatic load. The prompt stress system is the autonomic nervous system (ANS) with two branches the sympathetic (SNS) and parasym-pathetic (PNS) nervous systems that play an important role in regulating stress response. As a typical example and final endpoint of allostatic load, ischemic stroke and its complications are related to stress and autonomic dys-function. Different clinical tests are described for assess-ing autonomic function in ischemic stroke. This review may bring possibilities for future study to investigate specific treatment on ANS function and stress manage-ment on the context of traditional stroke therapies, and thus help improve the clinical outcomes and prognosis of ischemic stroke.