Resources

Stanford Stroke Assessment Test

The Stanford Stroke Risk Assessment test gives you the ability to estimate your stroke risk in comparison to others in your age group.

Stroke Prevention

Know What You Can and Can't Control

The more you know about stroke -- its types, symptoms, causes and effects -- the better you'll know how to prevent one from happening to you. The basics of stroke prevention are to follow a healthy lifestyle, choose healthy foods and control health conditions you may have, such as diabetes and high blood pressure.

In general, people who don't smoke, have lower cholesterol and are not diabetic have a much lower chance of stroke and heart disease. Smoking, in particular, is one of the highest risk factors for both bleeding strokes and ischemic strokes.

Risk Factors and Lifestyle Choices You Can Control:

  • Reduce hypertension (high blood pressure) with a healthy diet, less salt, less alcohol, less stress, no smoking and medications if necessary
  • Treat and control atrial fibrillation (irregular heartbeat)
  • Lower your cholesterol levels by eating a healthy diet, exercising, losing weight and taking medications in some cases. Try to reduce your LDL or "bad cholesterol" that can clog your arteries so it is less than 100mg/dL. Try to keep your HDL or "good cholesterol" at 60mg/dL or higher. HDL is good because it attaches itself to the bad LDL cholesterol and transports it to your liver where it gets filtered out of the body, thus reducing your bad cholesterol level
  • Don't smoke and if you do, stop immediately . St. Charles Health System offers smoking cessation programs, call 541-382-4321 for more information
  • Control diabetes (high blood sugar). The National Diabetes Education Foundation provides a great list of ways to manage your diabetes
  • Drink less alcohol
  • Stop using stimulant drugs (Methamphetamine in particular. Stroke risk in young people is significantly increased by meth use.)
  • Reduce obesity, being significantly overweight is a stroke risk factor that you can control
  • Exercise regularly to keep your body and immune system b
  • Eat a healthy diet to help reduce stroke risk factors such as high cholesterol and high blood pressure:
    • Eat five servings of fruits and vegetables per day and eat whole grains
    • Eat fatty fish like salmon, mackerel, lake trout, herring, sardines and albacore tuna; or take omega-3 supplements that equal 1,000 mg a day. Fatty fish are high in two kinds of omega-3 fatty acids, eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) that helps lower inflammation in the body and keeps cells and tissues healthy, including those in your heart, brain and skin.
    • Avoid eating food with trans fats, saturated fat, salt and high sugar content
    • Eat foods that have monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats, like olive and canola oil, which are liquid and clear at room temperature
  • Correct hyperthyroidism (too much thyroid hormone) and low blood oxygen levels

Risk Factors You Can't Control:

  • Increasing Age: The chance of having a stroke more than doubles for each decade of life after age 55.  While stroke is common among the elderly, a lot of people under 65 also have strokes
  • Gender: Men have a greater risk of attack than women, and they have attacks earlier in life
  • Heredity: the family history of health conditions you're born with. Your stroke risk is greater if a parent, grandparent, sister or brother has had a stroke
  • Race: Black women have a greater risk of stroke (and heart disease) than white women. Compared with whites, African-American men and women are more likely to die of stroke
  • Previous stroke, transient ischemic attack (TIA) or heart attack

Other factors that raise the risk of the intracerebral and subarachnoid hemorrhage types of stroke include:

  • Blood and bleeding disorders such as:
    • Disseminated intravascular coagulation, a serious disorder in which the proteins that control blood clotting are abnormally active
    • Hemophilia or bleeding disorder in which it takes a long time for the blood to clot
    • Sickle cell anemia is a disease passed down through families in which red blood cells are an abnormal crescent moon shape
    • Leukemia
    • Decreased levels of blood platelets (cells)
  • Use of aspirin or anticoagulant medications (blood thinners). If your doctor has prescribed you aspirin, don't stop taking it without their advice
  • Liver disease which causes increased bleeding risk in general
  • Brain or cerebral (head) tumors