Not so transient

You know how when you get a new car (maybe not new, but new to you) and all of a sudden it seems like almost everyone on earth has that same car? You see one beside you in the Walmart parking lot, one stopped at the red light…you get the point. Science is exactly the same. Until some scientific topic stares you right in the face, you don’t take all that much notice. This was the same with me and the topic of strokes until this summer when my dad had one. Now every science news website I look at, I can’t help but read the ones with a headline relating to strokes. He first had a TIA (transient ischemic attack) which is also known as a mini-stroke. He was having slight trouble talking and seemed confused but everything was fine. Within a few days he had a stroke which caused one side of his face to droop and he lost his speech. He also couldn’t remember how to do simple tasks such as making the coffee he had always been making because he didn’t even know where to place the water. All of these crazy things made me wonder what the heck was going on inside of his body due to one tiny blood vessel is his brain being blocked.

New research indicates that the TIA my dad initially had isn’t necessarily transient like the name implies. It can actually have long lasting effects and hidden brain damage. The patients studied in this research all had resolved the effects the mini-stroke had on their motor systems within 24 hours and when clinically evaluated 14-30 days later they showed no impairment. Interestingly though, when the patients were subjected to a brain mapping procedure it unveiled that the brain actually had damage that lasted much longer than was once thought. The brain cells on the affected side of the brain showed changes in excitability making it harder for neurons to respond.

Since these TIA’s are often warning signs and the chance of a stroke in the days following a TIA is greatly increased, this mapping technique may be of great help. Doctors say that by refining this technique they may be able to identify which patients are at greatest risk for a stroke following a TIA and therefore direct treatment that is more suiting for each individual case. My dad unfortunately was one of the patients who did end up having a stroke following his TIA, but it has been over half a year since his stroke and he is making great progress. His cognition is almost back to normal and he can speak full sentences now. The recovering that is going on within his brain now is an even more remarkable thing with both hemispheres of his brain working to compensate. Information about this can be seen in the article The changing roles of 2 hemispheres in stroke recovery.