Nurse's Mini Stroke Came With No Warning - If It Happens To You, Act Quickly

Thought I would respond to this since it happened to me. At 28 with no prior history and normally very low blood pressure I had either a TIA or small stroke. It started early in the morning with a headache (I NEVER have headaches). By 10:30am I was virtually blind with pain, had 0 equilibrium, could not hear out of my left ear and looked like I had bells palsy. My husband took me to the hospital where they did a spinal and found blood in the fluid. This was 25 years ago and they took a wait and see attitude. The pain subsided by the next day but I was left with 6 months of rehab and a line that goes right down the center of my body with a marked loss of sensitivity. I cannot detect pain on my left side and when I am tired my face and hand don't function at full capacity but I count myself fortunate. It could have been much worse. Today I would have reacted more quickly and perhaps would have had no residual affect.

In the last few days WSJ has done an article about a condition that is genetic and is responsible for a lot of medical problems. It is genetic and it causes thickening of the renal artery. It is totally under diagnosed and is present in 5 to 12 percent of all women. It can occur in men also but is not seen as often. There are a host of complaints and medical problems that women get that are not investigated properly when they actually have this genetic condition. Here are some of them, stroke, blood clots, sever hypertension drug resistant hypertension, sever head aches, a host of GI complaints including some fatal ones like messentary artery clots and anyurisms. Docs are taught in medical school that it a RARE condition. It is not rare at all, it is common and it makes very young women very ill. WSJ medical staff was alarmed enough by the study finding to use half a front page doing an article about it. If you are young women with no other medical condition or risk factors and you suddenly have a stroke you need to have a scan of your renal arteries and perhaps even a genetic test. They say the renal artery has a "string of pearls" look to it and it is a dead give away.