With Signs of a Stroke, Act Fast
Too few people with symptoms take prompt action, experts say

(HealthDay News) -- Though a stroke can be disabling and deadly, more than half of Americans who experience symptoms fail to seek immediate medical help.

That's the finding of researchers who are examining stroke data as part of a larger study of the so-called "Stroke Belt" region of the United States -- an area encompassing the Carolinas, Georgia , Alabama , Mississippi , Tennessee , Arkansas and Louisiana .

Virginia J. Howard, an epidemiologist at the University of Alabama at Birmingham , presented her findings at a meeting of the American Stroke Association.

People who experience stroke symptoms should get checked out because they could, in fact, be having a stroke, Howard told HealthDay . "And when in doubt," she added, "they should talk to their doctor or seek some guidance -- even if they just talk to their doctor over the telephone."

A stroke is also known as a "brain attack" because it cuts off blood flow and oxygen to the brain, says the National Stroke Association. It can lead to permanent brain damage, disability or death.

Most strokes are ischemic, meaning that a blood clot blocks a blood vessel or artery in the brain. Hemorrhagic stroke occurs when a vessel ruptures and bleeds into the brain.

Risk factors for stroke include tobacco use, hypertension, diabetes, heart disease, arterial disease, atrial fibrillation, high cholesterol, sickle cell disease, poor diet, and physical inactivity and obesity.

Roughly 600,000 new strokes are reported in the United States each year, according to the American Stroke Association. It's the nation's third-leading cause of death.

Anyone who thinks they might be having a stroke should treat it as an emergency, says the U.S. National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, because the longer blood flow to the brain is interrupted, the greater the damage.

Ischemic stroke can be treated with tissue plasminogen activator (tPA), a clot-dissolving drug. But its effectiveness depends on the person getting to the hospital within 60 minutes and starting intravenous treatment within three hours, according to the institute.

Howard's study, which included black and white adults aged 45 and older, found that 51 percent of people who reported symptoms but did not have a doctor's diagnosis of a stroke did not seek medical care.

Part of the problem is that many people don't recognize the symptoms of stroke, Dr. Dawn Kleindorfer, associate professor of neurology and a stroke researcher at the University of Cincinnati , told HealthDay . "It's not that they're afraid; they just don't recognize it as an emergency," she said.

Also, because stroke injures the brain, the person having the stroke may not realize it, leaving it to family, friends or bystanders to recognize the symptoms and act quickly on their behalf.

A quick stroke check, offered by the Stroke Collaborative, includes five points:

• Walk: Is their balance off?
• Talk: Is their speech slurred or face droopy?
• Reach: Is one side weak or numb?
• See: Is their vision all or partly lost?
• Feel: Is their headache severe?

If any of these stroke symptoms occur suddenly, pick up a phone and call 9-1-1.

On the Web

Learn more about stroke by visiting the U.S. National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke.

SOURCES: HealthDay News ; Virginia J. Howard, Ph.D., epidemiologist, University of Alabama at Birmingham; Dawn Kleindorfer, M.D., associate professor of neurology and stroke researcher, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio; National Stroke Association (www.stroke.org); National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, Bethesda, Md.; American Stroke Association, Dallas; Aug. 30, 2007, Stroke , online.
Author: Karen Pallarito
Publication date: May 31, 2009
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