Heart beat: "Mini-strokes" have major risks

Content provided by the Faculty of the Harvard Medical School

Heart beat: "Mini-strokes" have major risks

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Heart beat

“Mini-strokes” have major risks

What’s the difference between a stroke and a transient ischemic attack (TIA)?

At first, not much. They look the same, feel the same, and stem from the same thing — blocked blood flow to the brain. But a stroke lasts for hours, maybe longer, while a TIA fades away after a few minutes.

Don’t be fooled by the disappearance of symptoms. Even after they are gone, danger still lurks in the form of other TIAs, stroke, and even death.

A study published in the April 2005 Stroke looked at all the people who had a TIA in the Cincinnati area during a single year. In the three months following the mini-stroke, 1 in 7 people (14.6%) had a full stroke, and 1 in 4 (25.2%) had either died or suffered a stroke or another TIA.

British researchers, writing in the March 2005 Neurology, looked at the connection from the other direction. Among more than 500 stroke victims, 17% had experienced a TIA on the day of their stroke, 9% had one on the day before, and a whopping 43% had a TIA sometime during the week preceding the stroke.

These studies add to the mounting evidence that it’s time to take TIAs seriously. If you think you or someone you are with is having one, do the same thing you would do for a heart attack: Call 911.

Once the crisis has passed, your doctors should do two things: Start looking for what caused the problem, and do what they can to prevent a subsequent stroke or TIA.

TIA symptoms

Call 911 or your local emergency medical services number right away if one or more of these symptoms suddenly happen to you or someone else, even if they begin to fade away after a few minutes.

Numbness or weakness in your face, arm, or leg, especially on one side of the body
Inability to move your fingers, hand, arm, or leg
Trouble seeing with one or both eyes or hearing with one or both ears
Slurred speech or other trouble speaking
Difficulty understanding what someone is saying
Dizziness, trouble walking, or loss of balance or coordination
Rapid and severe headache

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Last updated:	August 21, 2006

Medical content reviewed by the Faculty of the Harvard Medical School. Harvard Health Publications, Copyright © 2007 by President and Fellows of Harvard College. All rights reserved. Used with permission of StayWell.

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