Barrow neurologist says coronavirus could cause strokes in young adults
May 20, 2020, 4:15 AM | Updated: 9:33 am
PHOENIX – A Barrow neurologist said Tuesday that some healthy young and middle-aged adults that have coronavirus are suffering strokes without presenting with any other symptoms.
“This appears to be another sinister aspect of a virus that can be relatively asymptomatic or completely asymptomatic in healthy individuals but in this instance would manifest as a stroke,” Dr. Michael Waters told KTAR 92.3 FM’s Arizona’s Morning News.
Waters said the risk of strokes in these types of patients are associated with a prothrombotic state, which means the body is at an increased tendency to form blood clots.
RELATED STORIES
“It’s something that we’re continuing to learn about on a daily basis and not something that we’ve been familiar with historically with respect to this population,” Waters said.
Waters said the population that is suffering these strokes generally has very few to no risk factors typically associated with stroke and cardiovascular disease.
The symptoms to watch out for with strokes can be summarized with BE FAST– balance, eyes, face, arms, speech and time.
These types of strokes that these patients are having are very treatable, and the outcomes tend to be good in the younger population.
“Because of this pro-thrombotic phenomenon, there’s medications we can give to patients that will counteract that and prevent them from having additional strokes,” Waters said.
Waters said people may be hesitant about going to the hospital because of the pandemic, but they shouldn’t if they believe they’re suffering a stroke.
“If you’re having a stroke, the only way we have any reasonable means of treating that is if you come to the hospital,” Waters said.
