Use the labels in the right column to find what you want. Or you can go thru them one by one, there are only 34,483 posts. Searching is done in the search box in upper left corner. I blog on anything to do with stroke. DO NOT DO ANYTHING SUGGESTED HERE AS I AM NOT MEDICALLY TRAINED, YOUR DOCTOR IS, LISTEN TO THEM. BUT I BET THEY DON'T KNOW HOW TO GET YOU 100% RECOVERED. I DON'T EITHER BUT HAVE PLENTY OF QUESTIONS FOR YOUR DOCTOR TO ANSWER.
Changing stroke rehab and research worldwide now.Time is Brain!trillions and trillions of neuronsthatDIEeach day because there areNOeffective 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. Did your doctor somehow miss the recovery protocol that Pedro Bach-y-Rita used to recover fully back in 1958 with only a partial brain?
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.
Showing posts with label stroke risk calculator. Show all posts
Showing posts with label stroke risk calculator. Show all posts
Every single stroke risk calculator I've
done, including this one, had me at an extremely low chance of stroke.
But I had one since my dad's doctor did not tell him to have his
children checked for carotid blockage when he was diagnosed at 80%. Or recommended not to do vigorous activities with your neck, like whitewater canoeing on class III rapids in Canada.
Every single stroke risk calculator I've done, including this one, had me at an extremely low chance of stroke. But I had one since my Dad's doctor did not tell him to have his children checked for carotid blockage when he was diagnosed at 80%.
In the United States, strokes are a top cause of death and a major cause of disability, according to the American Stroke Association.
This is a scary reality, especially since many of the stroke risk
factors are pretty silent (like high cholesterol and high blood
pressure) ― until they’re not.
But
just because some of the risk factors aren’t always obvious doesn’t
mean strokes can’t be controlled. In fact, it’s estimated that 80% of
strokes are preventable through lifestyle changes like exercise, diet
and more, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
No one knows
that more than the experts who treat the issue. Stroke doctors say they
think a lot about the key ways to lower their risk (and their patients’
risk) of stroke.
“I like to think of it more proactively — what I could do to prevent stroke,” said Dr. Anthony Kim, a vascular neurologist and medical director of the University of California at San Francisco Stroke Center.
Below, stroke doctors share the habits they personally avoid ― and why you should avoid them, too.
Have A Sedentary Lifestyle
According to Dr. Arthur Wang,
director of endovascular neurosurgery at Tulane University School of
Medicine, one of the modifiable risk factors for stroke is having a
sedentary lifestyle.
While there isn’t one across-the-board definition of a sedentary lifestyle, overall, it means spending too much time sitting or lying down and not enough time exercising or moving around.
“It’s been
shown that regular physical activity helps keep your blood vessels
clog-free. It stops the buildup of plaque in the arteries,” Wang said.
“And so we generally recommend that people get probably 30 minutes of
moderate exercise maybe five times a week.”
This could mean going for walks, runs, biking, gardening or joining a group workout class — there is no wrong way to get moving.
Ignore High Blood Pressure
“It
turns out that a lot of the same things that we would recommend for a
healthy lifestyle also reduce the risk of both heart disease and
stroke,” Kim said. “But if there’s one factor that is the most impactful
it would be blood pressure, blood pressure, blood pressure.”
Elevated
blood pressure, particularly over time, can lead to problems, he said:
High blood pressure is the biggest modifiable stroke risk factor.
“If
you took a magic wand and waved it and suddenly eliminated high blood
pressure from the U.S. population, there would be 60% fewer strokes,”
Kim said. “It’s by far the leading risk factor for stroke and we call it
the silent killer because oftentimes, patients don’t feel it; you have
to have it checked and monitored and treated.”
“If
you took a magic wand and waved it and suddenly eliminated high blood
pressure from the U.S. population, there would be 60% fewer strokes.”
- Dr. Anthony Kim, University of California, San Francisco, Stroke Center
Skip Regular Check-Ups
“These
risk factors oftentimes don’t have any real symptoms,” Wang said, which
is a worrisome thing to think about. “A patient would never know that
their blood pressure’s high, they wouldn’t know whether they have high
cholesterol unless all of this is routinely tested or screened on a
regular basis.”
This means it’s crucial that you visit your primary care doctor for
the routine check-ups that they deem necessary. They’ll screen you for
issues like high cholesterol and high blood pressure while checking
other risk factors like your blood sugar and weight, too, he added.
“I
think just being hyper-vigilant about those things, especially when
these risk factors for stroke are very cryptic, meaning that they don’t
manifest in any real symptoms, so it’s really important for patients to
understand that so they take the actionable steps to see their doctor to
get these routine screening tests,” Wang said.
Your
doctor can also review any risk factors outside your control, like
gender (strokes are more common in women, Wang said), race (they’re more
common in Black people, he noted) and personal history.
“In terms of previous medical history, those who have had prior strokes
in the past, or if one of their parents had a stroke in the past, are
at a much higher risk of having a future stroke,” Wang said.
Smoke
According to both Kim and Wang, one of the habits that is high on a to-avoid list is smoking.
“That definitely increases the risk of stroke, and heart disease, for that matter,” Kim said.
“And
one of the ways that it does that is by causing the blood vessels to
become narrowed over time, and that can ultimately lead to blockages in
blood flow to part of the brain, which is essentially what a stroke is,”
he explained.
Tom Werner via Getty Images
High blood pressure is a huge stroke risk, doctors say, but it can be managed through diet and medication.
Drink Too Much Alcohol
You’re probably aware that alcohol is not good for you. It’s linked to certain kinds of cancer, liver disease,
and yes, stroke, too. Specifically, Kim said there is an “association
between ... excessive alcohol use and heart disease and stroke risk.”
Alcohol recommendations vary by person, but, the CDC
considers more than four drinks in one sitting for women or five drinks
in one sitting for men to be excessive drinking. More than eight drinks
per week for women and 15 drinks per week for men is also considered
excessive drinking.
Generally,
it’s accepted that women should not have more than one alcoholic drink a
day and men should not have more than two, Kim said. These are also the
recommendations put forth by the Dietary Guidelines for Americans.
Ignore Your Diet
A
proper diet is important for managing stroke risk, too. This means
moderating foods that are full of saturated fats, sugar and salt, Wang
said. (Additionally, Kim pointed out that there is a relationship
between salt intake and high blood pressure, which, as we now know, is
another stroke risk factor.)
When it comes to what you should eat, Kim points to the work of author and journalist Michael Pollan.
This advice is “eat food, mostly plants, not too much,” Wang said. This
means having a diet that’s rich in fruits and veggies with some meat
added in.
Dismiss Necessary Treatment
Since
strokes are so common in this country (and this world), it’s important
that you’re aware of the signs and get treated as soon as possible.
Available stroke treatments work better the sooner they’re done, Kim
said.
“Because many
strokes aren’t painful, and the symptoms of stroke vary so much, it’s
important to recognize symptoms of stroke,” he said.
And, there’s a useful acronym to help people remember the signs — and that acronym is FAST, Kim said. FAST stands for “facial drooping, arm weakness, speech difficulty and time to call 9-1-1,” according to the American Stroke Association website.
“These
are not the list of all potential stroke symptoms, but any one of those
[factors] raises the suspicion that it could be a stroke, especially if
it happens suddenly,” Kim noted.
And, once again, it’s important to remember that getting treatment as fast as possible is vital, he said.
My risk of stroke was incredibly small yet
I had one because my Dad's doctor didn't tell him to have his kids
tested for carotid artery problems when he was diagnosed with 80%
blockage. Yes, mine was totally preventable but none of the stroke risk
calculators look for that risk.
A
new study used artificial intelligence and a single chest X-ray to
predict a person’s 10-year risk of dying from a stroke or heart attack.
Andriy Onufriyenko/Getty Images
Each year, an estimated 15 million people globally experience a stroke.
A person may have a better outcome following a stroke if treated quickly.
In
a new study, researchers used artificial intelligence and a single
chest X-ray to predict a person’s 10-year risk of dying from a stroke or
heart attack.
Each year, about 15 million people worldwide have a stroke, causing about 5 million deaths and leaving another 5 million permanently disabled.
Recently,
researchers from Massachusetts General Hospital developed a deep
learning model using artificial intelligence (AI) and a single chest X-ray to help predict a person’s 10-year risk of dying from a stroke or heart attack.
Most of us are familiar with the immediate signs of a stroke, but new research published in the Journal of Neurology Neurosurgery & Psychiatry
suggests that the warning signs could appear long before it actually
happens. In a study of almost 15,000 participants, researchers in the
Netherlands found that stroke sufferers show certain signs of cognitive
decline up to 10 years before they are taken ill.
After a stroke,
it is common for sufferers to experience physiological changes that
cause a decline in cognitive skills and make it tricky to carry out
routine tasks. Participants in the study were assessed on their
cognitive ability, and manual tasks such as washing and dressing, for an
average of 12.5 years to identify when these changes started. The
research found that stroke patients experienced far steeper declines in
cognitive abilities and routine daily functioning, starting about a
decade before their first stroke, than those who did not have a stroke.
Women, carriers of the APOE gene associated with Alzheimer’s disease and
those with fewer academic qualifications appear to be most at risk.
Sadly,
strokes continue to be common; it is estimated that someone in the UK
has one every three minutes and 27 seconds. But, previous research
published in the Lancet found that strokes are up to 90 per cent
preventable. So what are some of the other warning signs to look out
for?
Blood pressure
(My blood pressure didn't spike until 10 years after my stroke.)
According
to Stroke UK, high blood pressure, or hypertension, contributes to
around half of all strokes, making it the single biggest risk factor.
Peter Rothwell, professor of neurology and director of the Stroke
Prevention Research Unit at the University of Oxford, explains that
ischaemic strokes – which account for around 87 per cent of all strokes –
are caused by a narrowing of the arteries in the neck, and the brain,
related to hypertension.
“Hypertension also affects the heart and
causes atrial fibrillation. This can lead to blood clots forming in the
heart, which is a very powerful cause of strokes,” he adds. The best way
to check for atrial fibrillation is to monitor your pulse; it’s normal
for occasional beats to be irregular, but if it is continually
inconsistent then let your GP know.
You can have your blood pressure checked at a pharmacy, or measure it
yourself using a blood pressure monitor. If you are consistently
getting readings over 140/90, it is important to let your GP know. For
most people, simple lifestyle changes, and sometimes medications, are
enough to lower the reading.
TIAs (or mini strokes)
(My doctor told me I had a bunch of white matter hyperintensities, never showed them to me or prescribed any interventions to alleviate any problems. They obviously caused no problems, I had no symptoms of any kind.)
Sometimes,
people who experience a stroke will have a series of transient
ischaemic attacks (TIAs) before, which cause the same warning signs as a
stroke. “They are a sudden onset of neurological symptoms, caused by a
small clot that blocks the blood vessel. Rather than getting some
tingling in your hand that progresses over a few hours, it will come on
suddenly,” says Prof Rothwell. The symptoms are very similar to that of a
stroke; you might have numbness down one side of your leg, weakness on
one side of your face, or loss of speech or vision in one eye.
After
a TIA, the blood clot either dissolves by itself, or the brain has
adapted to not be damaged by the blockage, explains Prof Rothwell.
However, TIAs put you at a high risk of having a more severe stroke over
the next few days, so it’s important to seek medical help if this has
happened.
Blood thinning drugs, such as Aspirin, help to prevent,
or reduce, blood clots. If you aren’t sure whether you experienced a
TIA, Prof Rothwell recommends taking an aspirin anyway. “If it’s not a
TIA, then nothing is lost. If it is, it can have a dramatic effect on
the risk of a stroke," he says.
High cholesterol
(I don't really know my readings on this, but this simplifies it too much. The real problem is whether or not you are packing cholesterol into unstable plaque.)
Having
high cholesterol puts you at a greater risk of both heart attacks and
strokes. This is down to a buildup of fatty deposits in your blood
vessels, which make it difficult for blood to flow through your arteries
and can break off to form a dangerous clot. If you have a history of
early heart disease or stroke in your family, it’s worth taking a
one-off blood test to check if you have abnormally high cholesterol
levels.
However, lifestyle factors such as eating a poor diet,
being obese, or not doing enough exercise can also raise your chances of
having bad cholesterol.
Your family history
(One grandparent died of a heart attack, another of a stroke, both in their seventies.Mom at 92 still going strong,Dad died at 91 from Parkinsons and dementia.I had my stroke at age 50.)
Although you
can take preventative measures to reduce your risk of having a stroke,
your family history also plays a part. A 2003 study by London's St.
George's Hospital Medical School found that stroke patients who were 65
or younger were almost three times as likely as non-stroke patients to
have a parent or sibling who had an early stroke or heart attack.
“It
[family history] is more of a risk factor for having a stroke at a
younger age; your risk is probably double the average if you have a
sibling or parent who had a stroke, particularly if they had one when
they were young,” says Prof Rothwell. Generally, your chances of having a
stroke increase as you get older, with the risk doubling every decade
after age 55.
Lifestyle factors
Unhealthy lifestyle
habits, such as smoking, heavy drinking, a diet that is high in salt and
fat, and a lack of exercise, mean you could be heading for a stroke
later down the line. According to The Stroke Association, smoking makes
you twice as likely to die if you have a stroke. If you smoke 20
cigarettes a day, you are six times more likely to have a stroke
compared to a non-smoker.
Meanwhile, a poor diet may lead to an
increase in your blood pressure and cholesterol levels. A US study
published in the journal Neurology found that the average of
someone suffering a stroke fell from 71 years in 1993/4 to 69 years in
2005. The researchers put this decrease down to poor diets. To stay
healthy, the NHS recommends a low-fat, high-fibre diet, which includes
plenty of fresh fruit, vegetables and wholegrains.
You can use a stroke risk calculator
to work out if you are at risk. It takes into account your age, blood
pressure, cholesterol levels and family history to calculate your stroke
risk over the next 10 years.
(Every single stroke risk calculator I've done had me at minimal risk for a stroke. None asked the question; did either of your parents have blocked carotid or vertebral arteries? Dad had a carotid endarterectomy in his early 80s)
My grip strength was excellent with all the whitewater canoeing I was doing, my walking pace was also excellent. The only way to know the stroke was going to occur was if my Dad's doctor had told him to get his kids tested when he was found to have 80% blockage in a carotid artery. My risk level was non-existent from all the stroke risk calculators I have done.
Buttercup whitewater slalom races in MN and WI, I took 1rst, 2nd and 3rd in the three years prior to stroke in OC1 and 1rst two years in a row in OC2(Open canoe 2 person), partners have those trophies. Have not paddled whitewater since, if I flipped I would not be able to swim myself, the canoe and the paddle to shore. It is what I miss the most of my pre-stroke life.
Mayo Clinic Proceedings — Welsh CE, Celis-Morales CA, Ho FK, et al. | April 14, 2020
This study was undertaken to evaluate whether the addition of grip
strength and/or self-reported walking pace to established cardiovascular
disease (CVD) risk scores improves their predictive abilities.
Researchers included a sum of 406,834 participants from the UK Biobank,
with baseline measurements between March 13, 2006, and October 1, 2010,
without CVD at baseline. They evaluated the correlations of grip
strength and walking pace with CVD outcomes using Cox models adjusting
for classical risk factors (as included in established risk scores), and
Via alterations in C-index and categorical net reclassification index,
predictive utility was ascertained. The results of this study reveal
that the addition of grip strength or usual walking pace to existing
risk scores results in improved CVD risk prediction, with an additive
impact when both are added. Although further external confirmation is
needed, these tools could serve an important addition to CVD risk
screening due to these measures are cheap and easy to administer.
All the stroke risk calculators I've taken had me at an extremely low risk. Mainly because they don't ask about familial plaque burden. My Dad had 80+% blockage in one of his carotid arteries, with a push from his doctor I could have gotten screened and prevented my stroke from the same condition.
For
healthy individuals, the recommendation is a 5-yearly health check to
prevent cardiovascular diseases. However, according to a study published
in Lancet Public Health, a switch from 5-yearly screen intervals
to individualised intervals based on individual cardiovascular disease
risk level could annually prevent 8% of myocardial infarcts and strokes
without increasing healthcare costs.
Current American Heart Association, European Society of Cardiology,
and UK National Health Service guidelines recommend a 5-yearly health
check interval for screening of individuals at high cardiovascular
disease risk. This health check covers measurement of a variety of risk
factors including systolic blood pressure, cholesterol profile, blood
glucose, and smoking status.
If lifestyle interventions are inadequate to reduce the risk, the
guidelines recommend primary preventive medication such as statins.
However, the 5-yearly screenings are not based on direct research
evidence.
The study showed that current 5-year screening intervals were
unnecessarily frequent for low-risk individuals and insufficiently
frequent for intermediate-risk individuals.
“Our study shows that by optimising the screening intervals, 8% of
myocardial infarcts and strokes could be prevented without increase in
healthcare costs. This means that during the next 20 years, in the
English population aged now 40 to 64, the number of new myocardial
infarcts or strokes prevented annually could reach 5000,” says lead
author Joni Lindbohm, MD, PhD, University of Helsinki, Helsinki,
Finland.
The study followed over 7000 men and women over 2 decades. The
authors estimated the optimal screening interval by following
development of cardiovascular disease risk in 7000 English men and women
who participated in the Whitehall II study. This study measured their
cardiovascular disease risk factors according to the current guidelines
in 5-yearly intervals over a 22-year follow-up and collected data on
cardiovascular diseases using national electronic health and death
records.
Those at low risk for cardiovascular diseases spent on average 9
years in that risk category before moving to intermediate-low risk. The
participants then spent on average 7 years in this next category before
progressing to intermediate-high risk. However, the time spent in
intermediate-high risk was only 4 years; after this, over 70% of
participants progressed to the high-risk category that leads to
consideration of preventive medication if lifestyle intervention is
insufficient to reduce the risk.
An individualised screening interval would enable more effective
cardiovascular disease prevention by means of lifestyle intervention or
preventive medication, because of more timely detection of those at high
risk.
Reference: DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/S2468-2667(19)30023-4
SOURCE: University of Helsinki
Now if we can just bring these back down to earth. None of the existing stroke risk calculators identified me as being at any risk for stroke. Remember the Antarctic researcher who had a stroke in
Of course by the time the stroke was identified there was nothing anyone could do to help recovery. There are NO protocols anywhere that get survivors close to 100% recovery. Currently you are completely fucking screwed if you have a stroke. Your stroke medical professionals and stroke associations will lie to you about that fact but they will never provide any solutions until they are removed from power.
Researchers may have developed a more reliable way to predict the
risk of heart attack and stroke in astronauts – and the technique may
eventually help gauge the same danger for regular folks on Earth, too.
NASA astronauts currently undergo a special screening method that scans
coronary arteries for a buildup of calcified plaque. This calcium scan,
which is not routinely done in clinical practice, is a powerful tool in
assessing cardiovascular risk. Yet scientists have had trouble
integrating the results from these scans with traditional risk factors
for heart disease, such as high cholesterol, high blood pressure,
diabetes and family history of heart attack.
But researchers have developed a new equation that combines the calcium
scan scores with those well-established risk factors. The result is a
more accurate way to predict a person’s risk for having a stroke or
developing heart disease within the next 10 years, according to findings
published Monday in the American Heart Association journal Circulation.
“The application for NASA is incredibly important. You can imagine if
someone had a heart attack in space, it would be catastrophic for the
person and the mission,” said Dr. Amit Khera, a cardiologist and the
lead author of the study.
“But we were kind of serving two masters in this project. Obviously for
NASA, it's a tool they need to help in decision-making for astronauts in
their missions,” said Khera, a professor of medicine at UT Southwestern
Medical Center in Dallas. “But for terrestrial medicine as well, it has
lots of potential applications in terms of helping us predict better
who's at risk for heart attack and stroke, and who might need more
intensive treatments.”
The new risk scoring system is the first to help predict both heart
disease and stroke, said Dr. Michael Blaha, a cardiologist not involved
in the new study. It also looked at a younger age group than a similar
heart disease risk calculator developed several years ago that also
incorporated calcium scan results. That calculator, which Blaha helped
develop, was based on patients at an average age of 65. In the new
study, the average age was 51.
“It’s been clear within the last several years that the calcium score by
far adds the most risk-predictive value on top of traditional risk
factors, and this study helps confirm that,” said Blaha, director of
clinical research for the Johns Hopkins Ciccarone Center for the
Prevention of Heart Disease in Baltimore.
“I like this new risk score. The only thing I’m not certain of is where
it will fit in and what the clinical impact will be,” he said. “I don’t
know how unique will it be in the space of risk prediction tools, which
is already crowded.”
For astronauts and other professions that come with a high level of
danger, better cardiovascular risk calculators can be crucial. But
having such tools available for the general population could help
improve medical efficiency, Khera said.
Doctors already rely on certain risk factors to help gauge the need for
prescriptions such as cholesterol-reducing statins or whether they
should suggest a daily aspirin regimen for patients, he said. A new risk
calculator could help medical professionals refine those assessments.
“Hopefully, we can eventually apply this tool in office-based practices
to … communicate better [with patients] about their risk and do that
with more accuracy, so we can determine what might be the best treatment
for them,” Khera said. If you have questions or comments about this story, please email editor@heart.org.
I have a 1.6% chance in the next 5 years of having a heart attack or stroke when I calculated it for age 50 when I had my stroke. This calculator is only valid if you have not already been diagnosed with heart disease or stroke. But if I do it anyway for my current age it is 4.9% in 5 years.
The health of your heart is comparable to the average 41 year old Canadian.
But my stroke was completely preventable if my Dads' doctor had told him to have children ultrasound tested when he was diagnosed with 80% carotid blockage. These calculators are way off when confronted with really healthy people like myself.
But if it had not occurred I would still be living a life of quiet desperation and would never have become a pain in the ass to the stroke medical world.
Life is great right now. https://www.projectbiglife.ca/cardiovascular-disease
When I put in my numbers for my age at stroke I get ~%. So pretty worthless for someone who was as healthy as me. The only way to prevent mine was if my Dads' doctor told him to have children tested when he was found to have 80% blockage in a carotid artery. Now I'm doing the 325 daily from my original doctor prescription 12 years ago.
This is the negative side of alcohol. What is the positive side? Have your doctor lists pros and cons instead of reflexively stating no alcohol post-stroke.
But I'm not medically trained so I shouldn't be listened to.
Excessive alcohol consumption is widely known to adversely impact
many aspects of your health. It has been linked to cancer, liver
disease, and even dementia. But Tennova Healthcare wants you to know
that consistently drinking too much alcohol, particularly if you are
middle-aged, can also escalate your likelihood of a stroke.
“A recent study indicates that people who average more than two
alcoholic drinks per day during their 50s and 60s have a one-third
higher risk for stroke, compared to those who consume less alcohol,”
said Glen A. Pollock, M.D., a neurological surgeon with Tennova
Healthcare. “Up to age 75, the increased risk caused by heavier drinking
rivals the stroke risks posed by high blood pressure and diabetes.”
The study also showed that those who drink alcohol in excess are more
likely to experience a stroke as many as five years sooner than those
who drink less. The study did not identify a difference in the type of
alcohol consumed, but the data indicates that men should not exceed two
drinks per day and women should not go beyond one daily drink.
A stroke is the sudden death of brain cells, due to a lack of oxygen
caused by a rupture of an artery or a blockage of blood flow to the
brain. It is unclear precisely how alcohol consumption affects stroke
risk. Some experts theorize that alcohol’s propensity to thin the blood
is what increases the likelihood. Others point to the influence alcohol
has on blood pressure and atrial fibrillation (an irregular heartbeat),
which are two other health-related stroke risk factors.
“Regardless of the linkage, people who regularly over-indulge in
alcohol consumption should consider cutting back,” Dr. Pollock said.
“They should also become familiar with their other risk factors.”
According to Dr. Pollock, there are two principle types of stroke
risk factors: controllable and non-controllable. “Non-controllable risk
factors include gender, race and family history,” he said. “These are
aspects over which you have no influence. However, controllable factors
you can affect. They include diet and nutrition, physical activity,
tobacco use, and alcohol consumption. Modifying these lifestyle
behaviors can have a direct benefit, in this case by reducing the
likelihood of a stroke.”
To help determine your risk of suffering a stroke, Tennova Healthcare offers a free assessment tool at TennovaStrokeQuiz.com.
In as few as five minutes, the online tool identifies personal risk
factors for stroke, offers tips to take control of manageable risk
factors, and provides an instant report to share with your physician.
Visit TennovaStrokeQuiz.com to take the free stroke risk assessment.
The risk assessment is a piece of crap, nothing on use of alcohol. I'm at a high risk for another stroke in the next ten years because of my previous stroke. Shit, I'm already 11 years out from previous stroke so this missed the mark.
I can't tell if this was compared to all these other risk calculators out there.
There are 14 stroke risk calculators here so you can challenge your doctor about which one is best.
None of which showed me as having any elevated risk for stroke. You are going to need to know your weight in stone or kg. for this NHS one Result if I took the test prior to my stroke:
On average, someone like you can expect to live to the age of 78 without having a heart attack or stroke. My stroke was at age 50. Current results:
On average, someone like you can expect to live to the age of 79 without having a heart attack or stroke. I had to say I didn't have cardiovascular disease to get the calculator to work for me. https://www.thesun.co.uk/living/3222805/new-calculator-predicts-if-you-will-suffer-a-heart-attack-or-stroke-in-the-next-10-years/
A NEW online calculator can help doctors predict a patient’s risk of heart disease and diabetes.
The aim is to tell patients how likely they are to suffer a heart attack or stroke in the next 10 years, its creator said. SCROLL DOWN TO TAKE THE TEST
It is hoped that such a stark warning will help doctors inspire their
patients to make changes to their diet and get more exercise to ward
off the deadly conditions.
Dr Mark DeBoer, from the University of Virginia School of Medicine,
said: “This boils it down to telling a patient, ‘On the risk spectrum,
you are here, and you’re in a position where we’re worried you’re going
to have a cardiovascular event in the next 10 years’.
“My hypothesis is that the more specific information you can give to
individuals at risk, the more they will understand it and be motivated
to make some changes.” While
this new tool is designed for doctors to use, if patients have the
relevant blood pressure, blood sugar and cholesterol levels they can
calculate the risk themselves.
The NHS offers a similar test for patients that predicts when they will suffer a heart attack or stroke.
It asks for your date of birth, smoking status and gender before estimating your “heart age”. ARE YOU AT RISK? TAKE THE NHS TEST HERE. Go to link for test.
“The incidence of stroke is higher in men than in women,” Michiel H.F. Poorthuis, MD,
from the department of neurology and neurosurgery at the University
Medical Center Utrecht, the Netherlands, and colleagues wrote. “The
influence of sex-specific risk factors on stroke incidence and mortality is largely unknown.”
Poorthuis and colleagues performed a
systematic review and meta-analysis of observational studies published
between Jan. 1, 1985, and Jan. 26, 2015, that evaluated sex-specific
factors and their association with stroke. They used a generic
variance-based, random-effects method to pool estimates. Seventy
longitudinal studies and eight case-control studies involving 10,187,540
patients met inclusion criteria.
The researchers found an increased risk for
ischemic stroke in women who had any hypertensive disorder in pregnancy,
such as gestational hypertension, preeclampsia or eclampsia had (pooled
RR = 1.8; 95% CI, 1.49-2.18). Women with late menopause occurring at
the age of at least 55 years (pooled RR = 2.24; 95% CI, 1.19-4.21) and a
history of gestational hypertension (pooled RR = 5.08; 95% CI,
1.8-14.34) had an increased risk for hemorrhagic stroke. There was an
increased risk for any stroke in women with a history of oophorectomy
(pooled RR = 1.42; 95%CI, 1.34-1.5), any hypertensive disorder in
pregnancy (pooled RR = 1.63; 95%CI, 1.52-1.75), preeclampsia or
eclampsia (pooled RR = 1.54; 95%CI, 1.39-1.7), gestational hypertension
(pooled RR = 1.51; 95%CI, 1.27-1.8), preterm delivery (pooled RR = 1.62;
95%CI, 1.46-1.79) and stillbirth (pooled RR = 1.86; 95%CI, 1.15-3.02).
Conversely, there was a reduced risk for any
stroke for women who had a hysterectomy (pooled RR = 0.88; 95%CI,
0.85-0.9). In women with a history of gestational hypertension the
pooled RR of stroke mortality was 1.57 (95% CI, 1.04-2.39).
Men with a history of androgen deprivation
therapy had an increased risk for ischemic stroke (pooled RR = 1.19; 95%
CI, 1.05-1.34) and any stroke (pooled RR =1.21; 95%CI, 1.06-1.37). In
addition, men who had an orchiectomy had an increased risk for ischemic
stroke (pooled RR = 1.21; 95% CI, 1-1.46) and men with erectile
dysfunction had an increased risk for any stroke (pooled RR = 1.35
[95%CI, 1.18-1.53]).
“These sex-specific variables could be helpful
in identifying specific patient groups with an increased risk of
stroke, and individual risk factors should be considered in
recommendations on primary prevention of stroke and in secondary
prevention of stroke in patients with manifest cardiovascular disease,” Poorthuis and colleagues wrote. – by Alaina Tedesco
Disclosure: Poorthuis reports no relevant financial disclosures. Please see full study for complete list of all other authors’ disclosures.
A new assessment tool—the Million
Hearts Model Longitudinal ASCVD Risk Assessment tool—funded by the
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) in partnership with
the American College of Cardiology and the American Heart Association—
is designed to help predict the 10-year risk of developing
atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASVCD) and how that risk may
change over time as preventive treatments are initiated. The tool is an
extension of the ASCVD Pooled Cohort Equation first published in the
2013 ACC/AHA Guideline on the Assessment of Cardiovascular Risk.
ASCVD is a group
of conditions caused by atherosclerosis—a build-up of plaque that can
harden and narrow the arteries and lead to heart attack, stroke or
death. It is the leading cause of death, a major cause of disability,
and a major source of healthcare costs. ASCVD is largely preventable
through lifestyle changes and effective therapies.
The Million Hearts Initiative, developed by the United States
Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and supported by the ACC
and AHA, aims to prevent 1 million heart attacks and strokes by 2017
through the management of the "ABCS"—aspirin therapy, blood pressure
control, cholesterol management and smoking cessation. In support of the
Million Hearts Initiative, the Center for Medicare and Medicaid
Innovation (Innovation Center), a part of CMS, is testing a
large-cluster randomized payment model test of value-based payment—the
Million Hearts Cardiovascular Disease (CVD) Risk Reduction Model—to
determine whether financially rewarding clinicians for reducing 10-year
predicted risk for ASCVD across their patient population is an effective
way to reduce first-time heart attacks and strokes. Over 500 applicant
organizations were selected to participate in the Million Hearts Model.
In order to help test this Model, CMS funded the development of the
Million Hearts Longitudinal ASCVD Risk Assessment tool, in partnership
with the ACC and AHA, to improve on the ACC/AHA Pooled Cohort Equations
risk estimator, currently used by the practices participating in the
Model. In the study, the tool aims to provide a framework for delivering
appropriate risk-reducing strategies to Medicare patients with a
10-year ASCVD risk >30 percent.
To create the new tool, the Innovation Center's Million Hearts CVD
Risk Reduction Model partnered with the chairs of the writing committee
for the 2013 guideline, David C. Goff, Jr. MD, PhD, FAHA and Donald M.
Lloyd-Jones, MD, ScM, FACC, FAHA. The tool is not a replacement for the
ACC/AHA Pooled Cohort Equations risk estimator. Rather, the risk
estimator is incorporated into the initial risk assessments of patients
in the Model. The committee added existing evidence to extend the risk
equation.
"The new tool is based upon a formal systematic review of the
evidence of ABCS therapies to define what the expected risk reduction
would be from each one, used alone or in combination," said Lloyd-Jones,
who is the chair of the writing committee that describes the new tool.
"At an initial visit, clinicians can use the tool to project the
expected updated risk if one or more of the ABCS interventions were
initiated, then it can be used at a subsequent follow-up visit to
estimate what is the actual achieved updated risk based on the patient's
individual response to those therapies and any lifestyle changes they
may have made as well."
This approach to personalized estimation of benefits from
risk-reducing therapies may represent the next wave in clinical practice
to help target therapies to those in whom they will provide the
greatest benefit.
The goal of the tool is to assist not only clinicians, but also
patients, in understanding risk, monitoring risk over time, and
quantifying potential benefits of preventive therapies.
"This tool will help clinicians and patients with shared-decision
making and will aid in the understanding of how the ABCS may help to
reduce risk," said Lloyd-Jones.
More information:
Donald M. Lloyd-Jones et al.
Estimating Longitudinal Risks and Benefits From Cardiovascular
Preventive Therapies Among Medicare Patients: The Million Hearts
Longitudinal ASCVD Risk Assessment Tool, Circulation (2016). DOI: 10.1161/CIR.0000000000000467
David C. Goff et al. 2013 ACC/AHA Guideline on the Assessment of Cardiovascular Risk, Circulation (2014). DOI: 10.1161/01.cir.0000437741.48606.98
KUALA LUMPUR: With an estimated 40,000 Malaysians suffering from
stroke each year, and six new cases cropping up every hour, doctors at
the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia Medical Centre (UKMMC), have come up
with something new to reverse this worrying health trend.
Enter the Stroke Riskometer which was launched at the UKMMC last week.
The Star reported that this is the first ever Malay-language
smartphone application that allows users to calculate their risk of
stroke.
There are two versions of The Stroke Riskometer. A Lite version uses
20 scientifically tested questions for anyone between the ages of 20 and
over 90 to calculate the risk of suffering a stroke in the next five to
10 years.
It can also indicate risks for a heart attack, dementia and diabetes.
For a small fee, users can upgrade to the Pro version to get
personalised advice, save and track results, access to videos and
e-mailed results, the Star reported.
Over the past few years, the Government has struggled to reduce red
flags in Malaysian healthcare trends, said UKM medical faculty dean Prof
Dr Zaleha Abdullah Mahdy.
She said that an estimated 40,000 Malaysians suffer a stroke each year, with six new cases reported every hour.
UKMMC Neurology Unit and the university developed a Bahasa Malaysia
version of The Stroke Riskometer, an award-winning app from Auckland
University of Technology.
The app is free for download for Android and iOS users, and can be found at Google Play and the App Store.
None of the stroke risk calculators I've taken have ever shown me to be higher than a low risk. So that great stroke association would determine why all these calculators are missing predicting strokes. Well in a perfect world that would occur, but in reality we have crapola for stroke associations, doing nothing useful for survivors. http://www.cbsnews.com/news/aspirin-heart-health-cancer-prevention/
A government task force says a daily low-dose aspirin could help certain people in their 50s and 60s prevent a first heart attack or stroke - and they might get some protection against colon cancer at the same time.
The
U.S. Preventive Services Task Force issued draft guidelines Monday
recommending aspirin only if people meet a strict list of criteria -
including a high risk of heart disease and a low risk of bleeding side effects.
The
guidelines said the recommendation is strongest for 50-somethings, but
that doctors should decide aspirin therapy on a case-by-case basis for
people in their 60s, who can expect a smaller benefit.
Potential
candidates should have at least a 10 percent risk of a heart attack or
stroke over the next decade, have a life expectancy of at least 10 years
and be willing to take daily aspirin that long, and not have other
health conditions that cause bleeding, the guidelines said. That's
because prolonged aspirin use can trigger serious bleeding in the
gastrointestinal tract or brain.
When it comes to dosing, the
range that has been studied runs the gamut from high to low, but CBS
News medical contributor Dr. Tara Narula, a cardiologist at Lenox Hill
Hospital in New York City, says sticking to low-dose baby aspirin is
best.
"The evidence shows that there's really no incremental
benefit of going over 81 milligrams, and in fact, you may increase
bleeding risk by going over," she told "CBS This Morning."
Aspirin
therapy has long been recommended for heart attack survivors, but who
should try it for what's called primary prevention - protection of a
first heart attack or stroke - is less clear. And while studies suggest
years of daily aspirin use may lower the risk of colon cancer, no major health organizations recommend taking it solely for that reason.
Neither do the task force guidelines - the aspirin decision is supposed to be made on the basis of patients' heart health - but it concluded the cancer information would be useful as doctors and patients discuss the choice.
"If
you're a person trying to decide whether to take aspirin, you'd want to
be aware of all the potential benefits and the potential harms," said
Dr. Douglas Owens, a Stanford University professor and task force
member.
And could aspirin help reduce the risk of other cancers?
"There's
some research to suggest it might, but the evidence to date is really
just for colon cancer and you have to take the aspirin for more than 10
years to start seeing the benefit in terms of decreasing your risk of
colon cancer and decreasing your risk of dying from colon cancer," Narula said.
The
task force said there's not enough evidence to assess aspirin therapy
for those under 50 or over 69. The updated guidelines back aspirin for a
narrower age range than the last time the task force weighed the
question, but for the first time adds information about the possible
cancer benefit if people use aspirin long enough.
The guidelines
are in line with American Heart Association recommendations, said Dr.
Elliott Antman, a Harvard University professor and former AHA president
who welcomed them. In contrast, the Food and Drug Administration
last year ruled that there wasn't enough evidence to support marketing
aspirin for prevention of first heart attacks.
Guargantuan F*cking Whoopee. This statement really means they have given up on actually helping survivors. “A stroke is easier to prevent than treat.” Leaders tackle the difficult problems. We have NO leaders in stroke.
http://symbianone.com/2015/05/mobile-the-future-of-personal-medicine/ Stroke Riskometer’s™ forward-thinking approach(backwards to me) has been widely praised by medical professionals. The app has been endorsed by the World Stroke Organization, World Federation of Neurology, European Stroke Organization, International Association on Neurology and Epidemiology and was recognised by HealthTap AppRX as the Top Medical Conditions App of 2014 as voted by doctors from more than 100,000 apps. “Stroke Riskometer is a great example of delivering research through the modern technologies of mobile health,” emphasises Kevin Pryor, Chief Executive Officer of AUT Enterprises.
You can probably compare this to all the other ones because your doctor probably won't.
My risk when I had my stroke was nil because none of these have any way
to measure plaque buildup and the risk of that plaque rupturing. And
none will determine if your aneurysms are ready to burst But I bet your
doctor doesn't know anything either. This covers all the ones I've
written about.
I can't find the actual test so I can't determine if mine was predictable with this new one
The newest one here: http://www.alphagalileo.org/ViewItem.aspx?ItemId=151120&CultureCode=en
For the first time, scientists have developed a new risk score that
can predict the 10-year risk of developing heart disease or having a
stroke in persons aged 40 years or older in any world country.
The research is published in The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology
journal, and was led by Dr Goodarz Danaei, Assistant Professor of Global
Health at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health in Boston,
USA.
Danaei and colleagues developed, validated, and evaluated the new
score, called Globorisk, using data from eight cohort studies [1],
including more than 50 000 participants. Unlike previous risk scores,
Globorisk can be updated to fit local conditions and risk factor levels
in different countries using routinely available information.
Dr Danaei explains, “Globorisk is an important advance in the field
of global cardiovascular disease prevention. Until now, most prediction
scores were developed using a single cohort study and were never
validated for accuracy in national populations for low- and
middle-income countries. Therefore, clinicians and public health policy
makers in these countries were left without a reliable tool to predict
cardiovascular risk in their patients, community, or country.”[2]
Globorisk measures cardiovascular risk in individuals aged 40 or
older by factoring in the person’s smoking status, blood pressure,
diabetes status, and total cholesterol level, whilst adjusting for the
effects of sex and age on cardiovascular disease between countries.
The researchers recalibrated and applied their risk score to 11
countries from different world regions [3], using data from recent
national health surveys to replace the average age-and-sex risk factor
levels in each country and incorporating cardiovascular disease death
rates for each age-and-sex group. They developed country-specific risk
charts for predicting individuals’ risk of cardiovascular disease (see
figure 4 pages 7-14), and country-specific assessments of the 10-year
cardiovascular disease burden (see figure 5 page 15).
They estimate that the proportion of people at high risk (10% or
higher) of having a fatal heart attack or stroke within 10 years is
higher in low- and middle-income countries (eg, China and Mexico)
compared with high-income countries (eg, South Korea, Spain, and
Denmark). For example, in China around a third of men and women (nearly
170 million aged between 40 and 84 years) have a high 10-year risk of
dying from a cardiovascular event compared with only 5–10% of men and
women in Spain and Denmark (see figure 5 page 15).
According to Dr Danaei, “Globorisk can be used to identify
individuals at high risk of developing cardiovascular disease who are
most likely to benefit from lifestyle changes or preventive drug
treatment. Moreover, by estimating the number of people who have a high
risk in any given country we have more chance of accurately measuring
progress towards the WHO target of 50% coverage of multidrug treatment
and counselling for people aged 40 years and older at high risk of
cardiovascular disease.” [2]
Karel Moons from the Utrecht University Medical Center in the
Netherlands and Ewoud Schuit from the same centre and from Stanford
University in the USA, both authors of a linked Comment, say, “A next
step would be to quantify the effects, on a population level, of
introducing in these countries the Globorisk model combined with
subsequent risk-based preventative management. These quantifications
might further help, and indeed convince, decision-makers across the
world to decide on wide-scale introduction of prediction models and
risk-based management for cardiovascular disease.” [2]
I have no idea if any of these are any good. My risk when I had my stroke was nil because none of these have any way to measure plaque buildup and the risk of that plaque rupturing. And none will determine if your aneurysms are ready to burst But I bet your doctor doesn't know anything either. This covers all the ones I've written about.
The World Stroke Organization one here; http://www.world-stroke.org/education/stroke-riskometer
an iTunes version here; https://itunes.apple.com/nz/app/stroke-riskometer-pro/id725335289?mt=8
Heart
Health Calculator May Overestimate Risks, Doctors Say - See more at:
http://statenisland.ny1.com/content/lifestyles/health/198862/heart-health-calculator-may-overestimate-risks--doctors-say#sthash.YJZzVdxT.dpuf
Stanford
expert weighs in on new guidelines for statin use - See more at:
http://scopeblog.stanford.edu/2013/11/19/stanford-expert-weighs-in-on-new-guidelines-for-statin-use/#sthash.YR7NUIvg.dpuf
Heart
Health Calculator May Overestimate Risks, Doctors Say - See more at:
http://statenisland.ny1.com/content/lifestyles/health/198862/heart-health-calculator-may-overestimate-risks--doctors-say#sthash.YJZzVdxT.dpuf
Explore further:
Heart disease, stroke risk estimator app now available for health care professionals
