While a stroke is not considered as serious as cardiac arrest, it is still the third most common cause of death. Living with the effects of a stroke is often difficult and frequently life-changing. Getting a better understanding of what’s happened to your brain as a result of having one or more strokes is important.
Regular people, heads of state, and celebrities a like are all vulnerable to the results of a stroke. No one is immune. Knowing and understanding how it might make life more difficult and the required changes of approach can prove useful to make day-to-day living easier after it’s happened.
How Is the Brain Affected by a Stroke?
Strokes are either hemorrhagic or ischemic. With hemorrhagic strokes, a blood vessel has ruptured inside the brain with blood spreading around the brain itself.
Ischemic strokes are different. In this type, one or more major arteries carrying blood to the brain become blocked or a blood clot occurs. In 85-90 % of cases, an Ischemic stroke is the most likely.
The medical symptoms following a stroke include:
- Dizziness, difficulty staying coordinated when walking, and balance issues
- Vision problems in a single eye or both eyes
- Major headaches
- Weakness or numbness in areas of the body, such as the legs, arms, or face
- Speech problems.
Depending on the location of the stroke in the brain and the subsequent symptoms (including those that are delayed but appear months later) doctors can better comprehend what’s happened.
But that’s not all. With an MRI, they can go much further.
MRI Scans: Getting a First Look
Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) allows for a detailed look inside the human brain. The tests performed by hospitals and at specialist facilities use a strong magnet and intense radio waves to produce an image inside the brain.The advantage of MRIs like the brain scans from Express MRI is that they can visualize minor brain tissue changes that would be undetectable otherwise. Neither a CT scan nor a traditional x-ray can provide the appropriate visualization necessary. Even minuscule tissue changes as the result of a stroke become detectable through MRI technologies.
Getting an MRI test is often the “first look” test to determine whether a stroke was experienced, what type, and the severity of it. Lesions and other tell-tale signs of a stroke known as “stroke mimics” are evident. Also, a contract-enhanced version of an MRI can confirm the approximate location and size of the stroke that’s occurred.
Recovery from a Stroke
It is beneficial to monitor recovery through the use of an MRI. It detects the smallest of changes in the brain. It is a noninvasive way to initially assess and then further monitor the progress.
Certainly, while it’s possible for new stroke symptoms to occur a while after the stroke, recovery through improving the functionality and other positive changes following brain tissue damage is possible.
If you have suffered from a stroke, it’s worth using the science of neurology to provide greater insights into your brain’s status. While a hospital may only run an initial scan, a follow-up is useful to assess the progress which can be performed privately at a clinic.