Changing stroke rehab and research worldwide now.Time is Brain! trillions and trillions of neurons that DIE each day because there are NO effective hyperacute therapies besides tPA(only 12% effective). I have 523 posts on hyperacute therapy, enough for researchers to spend decades proving them out. These are my personal ideas and blog on stroke rehabilitation and stroke research. Do not attempt any of these without checking with your medical provider. Unless you join me in agitating, when you need these therapies they won't be there.

What this blog is for:

My blog is not to help survivors recover, it is to have the 10 million yearly stroke survivors light fires underneath their doctors, stroke hospitals and stroke researchers to get stroke solved. 100% recovery. The stroke medical world is completely failing at that goal, they don't even have it as a goal. Shortly after getting out of the hospital and getting NO information on the process or protocols of stroke rehabilitation and recovery I started searching on the internet and found that no other survivor received useful information. This is an attempt to cover all stroke rehabilitation information that should be readily available to survivors so they can talk with informed knowledge to their medical staff. It lays out what needs to be done to get stroke survivors closer to 100% recovery. It's quite disgusting that this information is not available from every stroke association and doctors group.

Saturday, April 20, 2013

Some—but not all—benefit from scan to detect narrowed arteries to the brain

You can talk to your doctor about this but they will just parrot this Harvard Medical School report.  I probably had no need for this ultrasound according to conventional expectations - being extremely fit, but my Dad had 85% blockage. So if one of your parents has clogged arteries that would be a known risk factor for stroke. Mine could have been totally prevented if my Dads' doctor had told him to warn any children to get scanned. But then I have no medical background so everything I mention is worthless.



Strokes seem to come out of the blue. But most of them happen due to decades-long damage to blood vessels and growth of artery-clogging plaque. That raises the question: Is there an early warning test for stroke?
Yes, and no. A test called the carotid ultrasound can detect the buildup of cholesterol-filled plaque in the carotid arteries in the neck. These arteries deliver blood to the brain. The test, which uses sound waves, is quick, safe, and without any immediate potential for harm. It makes perfect sense for someone experiencing lightheadedness, memory loss, or the warning signs of a stroke or mini-stroke. (I had none of these symptoms)
Having a carotid ultrasound test also makes sense for anyone in whom a doctor hears an abnormal sound called a bruit (BREW-ee) as he or she listens to the carotid arteries through a stethoscope. The scan is also a reasonable idea when a person has known risk factors for stroke, such as a previous “mini-stroke,” high blood pressure, high cholesterol, or diabetes. But a carotid ultrasound isn’t a good idea for otherwise healthy people at average risk for stroke.
The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force discourages routine echocardiograms of the carotid arteries. Only about 1% of the general population has significant narrowing of these arteries. And less than 10% of first-time strokes are associated with such narrowings. In addition, roughly eight in every 100 echocardiograms produce a false positive — a result that indicates the presence of significant narrowing that isn’t really there. False positives lead to unnecessary tests and possibly unnecessary treatment.
If you’re wondering whether you should ask your doctor for such a test, or whether to have one as part of a community check-up at a church or community center, here are some questions you might want to consider:
  • If the test finds something, what’s next?
  • If it doesn’t, are you in the clear?
For most people, a better approach would be to pay attention to fighting things that cause or contribute to the formation and growth of cholesterol-filled plaque — high blood pressure, high cholesterol, obesity, diabetes, not enough exercise, smoking, and the like. Getting those risk factors under control will go a long way to preventing stroke. (Pure intellectual laziness here because stopping the neuronal cascade of death could reduce the damage substantially)
For more information on ways to prevent and treat strokes, buy Stroke, a Special Health Report from Harvard Medical School.

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