Deans' stroke musings: Endicott hockey player sets the standard through stroke recovery

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.

Monday, December 12, 2022

Endicott hockey player sets the standard through stroke recovery

Wrong,wrong, wrong! This is a complete and total outlier. Only 10% get fully recovered, so this not standard by any means.

Endicott hockey player sets the standard through stroke recovery

BEVERLY - The walk into Raymond J. Bourque Arena is a welcome home for Jack Smiley.

The 23-year-old Endicott College student has only been back to campus one other time since his stroke in February.

"It's amazing every time I get back here," said Smiley. "I mean I am grateful for everything at this point in time, just walking outside and breathing fresh air. I have a sense of gratefulness toward it."

Smiley was on the ice practicing with his fellow hockey teammates earlier this year when he said things started to feel off. "I remember clear as day what everything felt like," said Smiley. "What I was seeing, where I was standing. Nothing in that moment was really a blur."

Smiley said his arms and legs started going numb. He quickly became disoriented and worked his way off the ice where his teammates stepped in.

"He couldn't move, he couldn't control his body, he couldn't talk," said Endicott Junior AJ Martinelli.

Smiley was put in the back of an ambulance and taken to the hospital. His family rushed up from Pennsylvania to be with him. Smiley recalled an early conversation from the hospital bed with his father, who asked for positivity.

"I looked at him and I was like, a majority positive thoughts, I will give you that," said Smiley. "A majority positive, but I will be allowed my moments."

Jack Smiley endicott hockey — Jack Smiley on the ice after suffering a stroke CBS Boston

Smiley was in the ICU for roughly a week before being moved to a rehabilitation center that he was in and out of for the better part of three months. He started documenting his recovery along the way. Keeping that positive mindset his father asked of him. His friends and teammates noticed.

"It's remarkable what he has been through," said Connor Beatty. Another teammate, Cameron Speak said, "I thought he was too positive before the stroke and then now after he is even more positive, and it is unbelievable."

To the awe of his teammates, Smiley was back on the ice just three weeks after his stroke with the help of a walker and therapists.

Smiley said his doctors have not mentioned whether he will be able to play hockey again.