Saturday News

Contents of This Week Saturday News ▶︎ December 5th / 2015

• Definition: Cerebral Arteriovenous Malformation (AVM)

A cerebral arteriovenous malformation (AVM) is an abnormal connection between the arteries and veins in the brain. The most frequently observed problems, related to an AVM, are headaches and seizures, backaches, neckaches and eventual nausea, as the coagulated blood makes its way down to be dissolved in the individual's spinal fluid. It is supposed that 15% of the population, at detection, have no symptoms at all. Other common symptoms are a pulsing noise in the head, progressive weakness and numbness and vision changes as well as debilitating, excruciating pain. A longer definition comes from Wikipedia.

• Video: Cerebral Arteriovenous Malformation (AVM)

      - Explaining All of the Options for AVM: Cerebral Arteriovenous Malformation
      - Treatment of Arteriovenous Malformation (AVM) - UCLA Neurosurgery
      - Brain Arteriovenous Malformation (AVM) | William’s Story
      - Nichole's Story: Surviving a Brain AVM - Mayo Clinic
      - Arteriovenous Malformations in the Brain & Cerebral Hemorrhage
      - Histopathology Brain -- Arteriovenous malformation
      - Perfexion Gamma Knife for Non-Invasive Brain Surgery - From the Patient's 
              Perspective
      - Endovascular Transarterial Embolization of Cerebral AVM With
             Ethylene-Vinyl Alcohol Copolymer
      - Advances and Innovations - Brain Arteriovenous Malformations Surgery
      - Microsurgical Resection of Brain Arteriovenous Malformations

• Headline Blog: Cerebral Arteriovenous Malformation (AVM)
• Forgiveness Friday: Energy in Motion, Part 1
• Mystery Solved!

• Eclectic Stuff: Many articles from many Guest Bloggers about Stroke
• Language Skills and Aphasia Recovery - Connected?
• Skeptics in the Pub
• Last But not Least, Thankful for Pets
• Coming From the Core
• Welcome to My Nightmare
• Answering Machine Challenge
• Insecure
• Splinting After Stroke? Why?
• Wii Fit Games for Children with Coordination Problems
• Holistic vs Homeopathic vs Medical: Who Is More Accurate?
• Aphasia Speech Therapy without Fear: Dancing to the Beat of Your Own Drum
• 50 Shades of the Power of Words

• Weekly Columnists
• Musing: Meeting the Criteria for Intravenous Thrombolysis
• Sunday Stroke Survival: Blech! Icky! Yuck!
• Caregiver: First Thanksgiving Without Bob
• Jester: Best Joke Ever
• TED Talks - Dr. John Krakauer: A Critical Window for Recovery After Stroke
• Rick Mercer Report: Rick and Fogo Island (part 1 & 2)
• Laid-Back Admin: Wikipedia - Erasmus Prize Laureate 2015

• Daily Comics: For Better Or For Worse, Dilbert, Mayes, Doonesbury

• Future Topics in SSTattler

     Saturday News | Future Topic
     --------------+------------------------------------------
     Jan/05/2016   | Emotion
     Dec/26/2015   | Christmas
     Dec/19/2015   | CADASIL Syndrome
     Dec/12/2015   | Stroke and Dementia 

Definition: Cerebral Arteriovenous Malformation (AVM)

Cerebral Arteriovenous Malformation
         From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

See as well:
      Arteriovenous Malformation From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Large Cerebral Arteriovenous
Malformation of the Parietal Lobe

A cerebral arteriovenous malformation (AVM) is an abnormal connection between the arteries and veins in the brain.

Signs and Symptoms

The most frequently observed problems, related to an AVM, are headaches and seizures, backaches, neckaches and eventual nausea, as the coagulated blood makes its way down to be dissolved in the individual's spinal fluid. It is supposed that 15% of the population, at detection, have no symptoms at all. Other common symptoms are a pulsing noise in the head, progressive weakness and numbness and vision changes as well as debilitating, excruciating pain.

In serious cases, the blood vessels rupture and there is bleeding within the brain (intracranial hemorrhage). Nevertheless in more than half of patients with AVM, hemorrhage is the first symptom. Symptoms due to bleeding include loss of consciousness, sudden and severe headache, nausea, vomiting, incontinence, and blurred vision, amongst others. Impairments caused by local brain tissue damage on the bleed site are also possible, including seizure, one-sided weakness (hemiparesis), a loss of touch sensation on one side of the body and deficits in language processing (aphasia). Minor bleeding can occur with no noticeable symptoms. Following the bleed's cessation, most AVM victims return to normal, after the blood vessel has had time to repair itself.

AVMs in certain critical locations may stop the circulation of the cerebrospinal fluid, causing accumulation of the fluid within the skull and giving rise to a clinical condition called hydrocephalus. A stiff neck can occur as the result of increased pressure within the skull and irritation of the meninges.

Diagnosis

Video: Cerebral Arteriovenous Malformation (AVM)

SSTattler: 
1) The two last YouTubes (of 10) is "real" surgery - if you are squeamish do not see them!
2) There are lots other YouTubes with parameters "AVM - Cerebral Arteriovenous Malformation”...

Explaining All of the Options for AVM:
         Cerebral Arteriovenous Malformation

Published on Nov 20, 2012

Imagine having the worst headache of your life. When should you seek medical treatment? Dr. Bernard Bendok from Northwestern Memorial Hospital discusses when a headache becomes an emergency situation. Learn more about the symptoms of a Cerebral Arteriovenous Malformation (AVM) and the latest treatment options.


Standard YouTube License @ Patient Power

Headline Blog: Cerebral Arteriovenous Malformation (AVM)

Definition: Blog (noun). Add new material to or regularly update to a blog. (≃1990s: blog shortening of weblog)

Forgiveness Friday: Energy in Motion, Part 1

Pamela Hsieh
StrokedUP

9 May, 2014













I had a profound discovery last Friday. While journaling that morning, I realized that I often have a tangle of thoughts in my head jumbling me up for what feels like hours, days — even turning me into the kind of person that just obsesses over philosophizing or whatever is bothering her. “I’m too in my head,” I’d tell people. “I need to somehow channel that energy in my head down into my body.”

Since the next free Red Tent Revival event is around the corner (and I recommend all women participate), long story short, part of what I’ve been doing in this extended absence — huge apologies for abandoning you!! — is plugging into the Pleasure Tribe, which is an online community of enlightened women banding together to learn about multiple facets of womanhood. The leader of our tribe is a woman named Kristin Sweeting Morelli, who established her multi-million-dollar brand on the principle that “everything is energy.” (Her iTunes Podcast of the same name was second only to Oprah’s back in the day.)

Part of the reason why I signed up to join the Pleasure Tribe is because I was interested in reclaiming by body and reconnecting my mind with it. I was feeling too “heady,” which I recognized as a very masculine energy, and I wanted to shift my focus back into my body.

Mystery Solved!

Elizabeth
Thankful for Every Day!

Wednesday, January 5, 2011

HI all,

For those of you wondering, we finally have an answer as to WHY I suffered a stroke during surgery. We had speculated but didn't really know why, until I spoke with Dr. Spetzler yesterday. I had seen Dr. Spetzler on many occasions while I was in the hospital, but I wasn't thinking clearly enough to ask the right questions at the time, once in rehab I did start to question WHY even though I knew there was the risk of stoke prior to surgery and answers as to what happened were not going to change the outcome or my overwhelming joy of getting this thing out of my head... but I still wanted to know... and now I do know. To explain what happened I should probably start at the beginning.

As it turns out my cavernous angioma was in a very difficult location, in the middle of my brain in the insular cortex right next to the right basal ganglia.... a place most neurosurgeons don't ever want to go. I knew this from the very beginning when the first neurologist read my first MRI 8/31/09  and told me," You have a very small cavernous angioma (CM)... something you were born with in the middle of your brain... it's nothing to worry about and you better hope you never need it out because they will not be able to get it out without causing you a lot of problems." She proceeded to tell me that lots of people(statistics show1 in 100-300) have cavernous angiomas and according to this first doctor they NEVER cause anyone any problems(sooo not true!!!!). I asked her if my complaints(dizziness, eye problems(can't see moving objects), and a strange feeling of being "out of it" that comes and goes 20-30 times a day(later determined to be partial seizures) were related to my CM... she told me ,"NO, this is an incidental finding... nothing to worry about and it's not causing your problems. You probably have an inner ear infection" and she sent me on my way with a prescription for sea-sick medicine which did nothing to resolve my complaints.

Eclectic Stuff

Definition: Eclectic (noun). A person who derives ideas, style, or taste from a broad and diverse range of sources

Language Skills and Aphasia Recovery - Connected?

Jeff Porter
Stroke of Faith

Tuesday, November 24, 2015

Should have taken those French classes in high school.

Turns out that for stroke patients suffering from aphasia, a language problem that affects thousands a year, bilingual brains sustain less stroke damage:

▶ Compared to patients who spoke only one language, bilingual stroke patients were more than twice as likely to have normal cognition following their stroke and they also performed better on tests measuring post-stroke attention and function. 

▶ But the two groups had similar frequencies of aphasia, at 11.8% among monolinguals and 10.5% among bilinguals (P=0.354), which might be explained by a higher level of cognitive control in patients speaking two or more languages, Suvarna Alladi, DM, of Nizam's Institute of Medical Sciences in Hyderabad, India, and colleagues wrote online in Stroke. 

▶ "The only outcome not influenced by bilingualism was the frequency of aphasia," the researchers wrote. "Although this might look surprising at first sight, this finding is in-line with current research, suggesting that the mechanism underlying the protective effect of bilingualism is not because of better linguistic but executive functions acquired through a lifelong practice of language switching."

All kidding aside about missing French classes decades ago, I hope this research leads to some tools that could help in stroke recovery therapy - bilingual or not.

See the original article:

Language Skills and Aphasia Recovery - Connected?

in

Stroke of Faith

Skeptics in the Pub

Barb Polan
Barb's Recovery

November 18 / 2015

Tom and I have started going to monthly club meetings of "Skeptics in the Pub." We go, drink draft beers, eat appetizers, and listen to a presentation about a selected topic and a discussion following the presentation. There are power point slides and selected videos.

At the first meeting we attended, the man sitting next to us said he enjoys attending the meetings because all the members are so smart, it makes him feel smart too.

I don't speak up during the discussions. I don't speak up in public at all. I think of things I might say, but keep them to myself. Never would I contribute to these conversations - the others are just so smart they make me feel like an idiot, and I'm sure I would say something in a way that embarrassed me - choking up, stumbling over my words, forgetting what my point is mid-sentence, and/or blushing deep red. So I listen.

Last month's topic was Oliver Sacks, who was a neurologist I really admired (he died this past summer). Last night's topic was "Are Skeptics too Dogmatic?"

Last But not Least, Thankful for Pets

Diana Smith
Beyond Reality

November 30, 2015

Ash chilling like a villain on Thanksgiving Day. She is allergic to turkey, and millions of other foods and environmental things. I gave her a roasted carrot for a treat. She was pretty good, not begging too much. She had a twin sized mattress, sheets, toy, and comforter to snooze with. She also had lots of attention from a two year old, whether she wanted it or not.

This last day of Attitude for Gratitude, or Thankful November, I am thankful for my pets attention, warmth, reason to get up in the morning (and middle of the night), therapy, warmness, entertainment and laughs. I adopted a female black fluffy cat this year. She is a hunter, so I appreciate not seeing any signs of mice yet this year. If it was not so expensive for the vet bills, I would recommend everyone get a pet or two. If you can afford it, adopt don’t shop. There are too many unwanted beautiful souls in shelters, living on the streets and in the wilds.

I hope everyone can find something to be grateful for. Next month, I am going to try to do daily positive affirmations!

See the original article:

Last But not Least, Thankful for Pets

in

Beyond Reality

Coming From the Core

Marcelle Greene
Up Stroke

Friday, November 27, 2015

One of the first observations Eric made when analyzing my walk was that my stomach muscles were not engaging. I've heard  "Let your fingers do the walking," but "Let your belly do the walking?"

Many muscles, not just leg muscles, play a role in walking. I was engaging only the powerful quadriceps on top of my thigh to swing my leg forward from the hip. Eric wanted me instead to tighten my abdominal muscles and use them to help lift my leg forward.

At first the abdominals on my affected side would not engage. To "turn them on," Eric sat me in a chair and told me to exhale as if I were blowing up a balloon. Once I could force no more air out, I froze my belly muscles in that tight position and held it as long as I could. No sit-ups, no crunches, but I broke a sweat.

My abdominals now remembered what it felt like to work and had been given permission to do so. I practiced walking, using my abs to help lift my leg, which no longer felt as heavy as when I had been swinging it. Over time, my abdominal muscles began to flatten instead of bulging uselessly on the affected side.

Now we're working on my back muscles, which need to help stabilize me when walking.  This has proven especially challenging because of a lower back problem that preexists my stroke. Apparently, I have been misusing my abs and back muscles for years.  Now that I'm addressing the core issues, my back pain has changed; it's no longer a spike in the hip joint, but a soreness in the hip muscle – like after a good work-out.

I think I'm learning to walk properly for the first time in my life.

See the original article:

Coming From the Core

in

Up Stroke

Welcome to My Nightmare

Leslie
Living After Stroke

This entry is part 1 of 7 in the series Never-Ending Nightmare - Someone Please Wake Me Up:

• ----> Welcome to My Nightmare
• Water Will Fix Me
• My Brain is Broken
• Ignorance is Bliss
• Hell’s Hallway
• Insanity Reigns
• Learning to Live Again

Welcome to My Nightmare

Where to begin……………..

This has been the hardest choice I’ve had to make. It has prevented me from making this blog public. I can play all day with layout and function. I write like crazy in my journal. Actually entering my first post leaves me speechless.  Well not really speechless.  As you’ll soon discover, I actually have too much to say. :-) I’m just very private and scared to put myself out there for the world to see.

The water‘s never going to be the perfect.  I’ll never feel comfortable exposing myself.  With May being Stroke Awareness Month in the U.S., now seems like the ideal time to just dive in……………………………………….

Once upon a time, in a world light-years away, lived an ordinary 46-year-old woman who had no idea that the world she was so familiar and comfortable with would vanish in an instant. The world she knew was replaced with a world she never could have imagined existed, even in her wildest dreams.

Hi, I’m Leslie, welcome to my Nightmare.

Answering Machine Challenge

Rebecca Dutton
Home After a Stroke

November 26, 2015

Opening voice mail requires a code.  I use an answering machine because all I have to do is push the blinking button on the machine to hear a message.  I also use an ear bud to listen and speak into the phone.  My wireless phone and ear bud allow me to go to the table to take notes and go to the couch to talk for an hour to friends and family hands free.

Dilemma.  I thought I was being clever when I hung the ear bud on the antenna for the phone.  Hanging the wire in front of the phone makes the ear piece cover the blinking button (under red arrow).  I have made this mistake many times.  Then I missed a message from a dear friend who called me after her surgery.  Having my friend think I did not care enough to return her call made me change my behavior.  Maintaining relationships has been a valuable part of my recovery.

Solution.  Now I place the wire for the ear bud behind the phone and make sure the ear piece is not covering the blinking button (see red arrow).  Even this change was not enough.  I have to turn the phone so it points towards the corner of the counter (3rd photo) instead of being lined up with the edge of the counter (2nd photo).  Now when I walk in the front door I can see the blinking light as soon as I pass the TV.

See the original article:

Answering Machine Challenge

in

Home After a Stroke

Insecure

Beth Sinfield
Beth Story

Thursday, 26 November 2015

I don't know about any of you lot that have had strokes but it took pretty much all of my confidence. I hated myself and who I'd become. I was anxious and emotional over any little thing; my mind was in limbo, my emotions all mixed up. I just seemed to cry all the time. I was scared of doing the simplest of things because I feared rejection and embarrassment. I hated going out in public; straight out of getting out the car, all eyes would be on me and I would trudge, head down, into a shop. I became isolated too; my friends had all gone to university and it was incredibly hard to make new ones.

I went from being
a skinny minny:

And, don't get me started on looks; my face had some residual drooping (and no amount of makeup would hide a drooping eyebrow), my left arm hung awkwardly out of my shoulder socket (called subluxation) and after 4 whole months of not eating anything, when I was allowed to eat again, I wanted all food. McDonald's, Chinese takeaway, vast amounts of chocolate. Jam doughnuts were my favourite treat. Before I knew it I had become a lot heavier in weight. Before my stroke I was underweight-ish then I lost nearly 10kg... then I piled it back on. And more. I hated it. And I had little way of exercising; I was confined to my wheelchair most of the time and very weak.

Splinting After Stroke? Why?

Peter G. Levine
Stronger After Stroke

Sunday, November 29, 2015

The research into splinting stroke survivors is clear: It does not work. Let’s have a look.

Forget individual studies… they don’t count for much. Rather, let’s look at the meta-analyses (or “metas”). Metas are studies of all the studies available and will quickly tell you if something works. The granddaddy of all metas, the Cochrane review, has looked at splinting after stroke. The review states,

“Nine studies with a total of 391 participants investigated the effects of splinting. The mean effect of splinting on joint mobility was 0°”

Ouch.
...

After stroke there are a number of reasons that you’re supposed to splint the wrist/hand/fingers. Here is the logic:

The survivor tends to posture with the wrist and fingers flexed (bent at the wrist and the fingers in a fist) Why do survivor’s posture like that? It has to do with the brain injury. Because the brain is no longer in full control, the stronger of the two muscle groups takes over. Imagine you have a ping pong paddle in your hand… what movement do you think is stronger, the wrist extended (like the follow through in a ping pong backhand), or the wrist forward (like the follow through in a ping pong forehand)? It’s actually the forehand/ flexion posture. OK, that’s why the wrist flexes (down, towards the forearm). What about the fingers? Same thing… the moment of the fingers to close the fingers (fist) is stronger than the movement to open the hand.

Wii Fit Games for Children with Coordination Problems

Bill Yates
Brain Posts

Posted 30th October 2015

Among the types of development problems of childhood is developmental coordination disorder or DCD.

In DCD, children show delay and subnormal performance in coordinated motor skills.

This may be noted as a general tendency of clumsiness with difficulties in activities such as catching a ball, using scissors, handwriting or riding a bike.

Computer games such as the Nintendo Wii platform provide a method to improve a variety of motor and coordination skills in a fun environment.

A South African team recently published a study comparing children with and without DCD on motor learning using the Wii ski slalom game.

In this study, the Wii ski slalom game was integrated into a school classroom setting. Children with and without DCD engaged in 20 minutes of the ski slalom game twice a week for five weeks. Performance in the game and on a motor assessment battery was assessed at baseline and at the end of the training period.

Holistic vs Homeopathic vs Medical: Who Is More Accurate?

Joyce Hoffman
The Tales of a Stroke Patient

Nov 23, 2015

A very long time ago, when I was a college professor (but not anymore because the stroke eclipsed that opportunity), I was teaching a class of freshmen the art of composition. Included in that group was a middle-aged man who, as it turns out, was a Tai-Chi Master, having found out through my first assigned essay, "What's Your Passion." While the unworldly freshman wrote about their passion for video games and shopping, the erudite man wrote about his interest in homeopathic (or holistic) remedies. I remember his words.

"Everything you need to keep yourself healthy is right here on earth, from headache to rash, from stomach pains to diarrhea."

The class laughed when he said diarrhea, totally being freshman, but the man didn't skip a beat and went on.

"The only trick is finding what cures what. But once you find a remedy for your particular ailment, you'll forever stick with it."

My student, as it turns out, was into homeopathy. But it falls under the holistic umbrella. Mother Nature Network uses this example:

"Feel a cold coming on? You could nip it in the bud with conventional medicine, or you could consider a homeopathic or holistic approach — but what's the difference?

Aphasia Speech Therapy without Fear: Dancing to the Beat of Your Own Drum

Mark A. Ittleman
The Teaching of Talking

November 29 / 2015

As many of you know we are pursuing research at a major University in Southern California and teaching graduate students The Teaching of Talking Method.  I have to walk about a mile from where my car is parked to the building where the speech clinic and lecture halls are.

I was walking to class_ the other day and the fellow in the picture above was walking directly in front of me, listening to his headphones, dancing and jiving as if there was no one else in the whole world!

Free of ridicule or criticism

Would you do that?

And it did not matter a bit to him who was or wasn’t watching.  He was doing his own thing in his “own world.”

As I walked behind him, my first inclination was to be critical of this guy who was dancing and singing to himself as others watched with amusement.  However that though changed in a second, as I also realized how wonderful it is that we are free to do as we wish in this society, and not fearing ridicule, or the criticism of others.  So my initial, knee-jerk sarcasm changed immediately to one of respect and admiration!

50 Shades of the Power of Words

Sas Freeman

November 29, 2015

I am currently still trying to fight pericarditis and feeling unwell. I opened a message to receive a special gift a very clever poem. It’s words so kind whilst reading it brought tears to my eyes. It is so special to me and such a clever poem I feel the need to use it as my blog this week and share it with you all.

It means so much to me and helped me feel so much better emotionally due to it’s kindness, the thought and time taken to write such a special gift. Something I will cherish. I am going to have it framed and next to my desk.

Poem

See the original article:

50 Shades of the Power of Words

in

Sas Freeman

Weekly Columnists

Definition: Columnist |ˈkäləmnist| (noun). A blogger or a journalist contributing regularly to a blog or newspaper