A Stroke of Insight

According to the CDC, every 40 seconds, a person in the United States has a stroke, and every 4 minutes, someone dies from one. It is the leading cause of disability and in the top five causes of death. The scariest part about it is that there may be no warning signs. A stroke happens suddenly with all of its symptoms happening at exactly the same moment. So what is this silent killer and what can be done to prevent it? A stroke is a lack of blood flow to the brain, either due to a blockage of blood in an artery or cranial hemorrhaging. When blood flow ceases, the brain gets oxygen deprived. This can cause fainting, numbness, slurred speech, loss of vision, and many other symptoms, depending on which part of the brain is lacking oxygen. It can often result in brain damage if the problem is not resolved.

Blockage of blood is called an ischemic stroke. The most common ischemic stroke is due to a blood clot in the brain, called a thrombus. They can also occur due to an embolus, large clumps of fat, atherosclerosis, cancer cells, or any other large clump in the blood. An embolus in a free-floating clot. They are common in the heart and are the second most common form of a ischemic stroke. This kind of stroke is due to generally due to a high blood pressure (BP). High BP can be caused from an improper diet, atherosclerosis, metabolic syndrome, obesity, a diet rich in low-density cholestrols, and many other things. As age increases, so does the risk of increased BP.

Hemorrhagic strokes account for one fifth of the total and due primarily to a faulty artery bursting in the brain. The artery can be thought of as a balloon. The more the balloon is blown up the more it gets stretched thin. Eventually just blowing it up in its normal fashion will cause it to burst. This is the same with the arteries in the brain. They get rubbed thin by blood passing by them, especially if the blood is thick due to an improper diet. Eventually, they rupture. This is called an aneurysm. Hemorrhagic strokes are often linked with previous head trauma and are the more dangerous of the two.

When the blood is blocked due to a build up in the arteries, the oxygen-deprived parts of the brain shut down. Sometimes the cases are so severe that the person must be admitted to a hospital and given a clot-busting drug to restore blood flow. Other times the build up of pressure behind the blockage is enough to push the clump through the artery allowing more blood to flow. When the blood is leaking out due to hemorrhaging, most often the patient will need surgery.

The most common surgeries are a intracranial or extracranial bypass and carotid endarterectomy. The bypass is a surgery used to reroute blood flow away from a plaque-infested or blocked pathway. It's like if the were in accident on the freeway and instead of clearing all the cars, they just reroute them permanently through a detour. An endarterectomy, shown on the right, is a procedure where surgeons remove build up of plaque. In this situation, instead of rerouting cars, they simply take out some of the slower cars to avoid any jam in the first place. After a stroke, a person may need to be in rehabilitation for speech, muscles, or work. If he or she was without oxygen for long enough they can cause serious brain damage as well as muscle damage, if the clot was formed elsewhere than the brain.

In either case, even after the blood has been restored, the person is still at a high risk for another stroke. In order to decrease the risk of another stroke, patients often take medication to reduce their blood pressure including diuretics, vasodilators, ACE inhibitors, beta blockers, and a variety of others. The most common medication taken after a stroke is aspirin, which reduces the platelet count. Platelets are the blood cells that help in clotting. An aspirin a day has been shown to reduce the chance of a stroke.

In order to prevent a stroke, it doesn't hurt to take an aspirin a day, but the most important thing is to eat right and keep blood pressure at a normal level. Eating foods high in high-density cholestrols will help in the removal of unwanted clumps in the blood stream. The best foods in this case are ones that are not high in fat. This will also reduce the amount of free fatty acids in the blood, which are the cause of atherosclerosis. Eating healthy and going to the doctor often are the best ways to live a healthy life.

“Aneurysms.” A.D.A.M. Medical Encyclopedia, PubMed Health, 13 August 2010. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0002109/

Imholtz, Alex. “Blood Questions.” Anatomy and Physiology at Prince George's Community College. http://academic.pgcc.edu/~aimholtz/AandP/PracticeQuestions/Blood/bloodq2.html

“Relating to Heart - Atoguard & Atoprin (Atenolol+Amlodipine+Aspirin).” Perk, 2012. http://www.perk.in/ato-guard-prin-folder-product-information.htm

“Stroke: Hope through Research.” National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, 6 September 2012. http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/stroke/detail_stroke.htm#214271105 

Images:

http://www.michiganstrokenetwork.com/Treatment/Overview/v/Hemorrhagic/patients.aspxOverview/v/Hemorrhagic/patients.aspx

http://www.vascularweb.org/vascularhealth/Pages/endarterectomy.aspx

http://www.perk.in/ato-guard-prin-folder-product-information.htm