Stroke Advice

[JennyKB]

My nan had a stroke almost 2 weeks ago and I'm just searching for some answers and explanations.

In the weeks before her stroke she mentioned having a pins and needles type feeling in her brain.

Is this a know warning sign?

[Hidden]

In my experience a stroke can happen without any advance signs or feeling unwell.

[courtley]

I had two strokes, a week apart, and each time I had felt perfectly fit. I had no warnings at all, it just happened. And even when it happened I was still unsure whether it was a stroke or not. It was the ambulance men who thought it was. I thought I was an intelligent person but it fooled me.

[Hidden in reply to courtley]

Me too. I was a gym bunny with the right weight, HDL and total cholesterol; I do have exercise induced AF. Felt great one morning then I fell over and was immediately blind on the right hand side. The ambulance paramedics talked to me for an hour before they realised that my responses were getting slower and that I'd had a stroke. Blue light run to the hospital where I needed two CT scans; the second to check for haemangioma in my brain before I could be thrombolysed. Exactly four weeks later I had what appears to have been a TIA with no advance signs.

[TonyToo]

While it's not a common occurrence, I reckon there are "signs" leading up to a stroke but we're often too wrapped up in ourselves to see them or do anything about it.

Or I could say I was too busy having a stroke to notice...

[Hidden]

Hi Jenny;

welcome to the forum. We are fewer in number and post less than the AF Association forum but we'll do our best to answer the complex questions that arise with strokes. The Royal College of Physicians published Guidelines in 2016 for clinicians and a separate guide for patients and carers. The patients version can be downloaded at:

strokeaudit.org/Guideline/P... That may answer some of your questions. The clinicians version is mostly readable by the general public like you and me but that can wait until the future. You could also try to contact the Neurologist who treated your Nan. I see that you've not had the easiest time either, so I wish you and your Nan better times. Come back and chat when you need to.

Namaste

John