1 In 3 Young Adults In The US Don't Know Stroke Symptoms, Especially Those at High Risk

You probably know someone who's suffered a stroke. As a leading cause of death (No. 5) and disability around the world, it's just that common. Every 40 seconds, a person suffers a stroke in the United States, and every four minutes, someone loses their life to a stroke. In all, nearly 800,000 people in the U.S. have a stroke each year. 

To back things up for a second, stroke is a type of cardiovascular disease. When the blood supply to part of the brain is blocked (ischemic stroke) or a blood vessel in the brain bursts (hemorrhagic stroke), brain cells are damaged or die. The overwhelming majority of strokes (87%) are the ischemic type, which are usually caused by a blood clot or atherosclerotic plaque buildup over time. From problems speaking and seeing to full-on paralysis, the effects of strokes can be debilitating and even deadly. 

Do you know the top five signs of a stroke? If not, you're not alone according to this recent study published in the journal Stroke. The research was led by Khurram Nasir, M.D., MPH, M.Sc., an expert in preventive cardiology from Methodist Hospital in Houston, Texas. In this study, Nasir and colleagues examined how well young adults in the U.S. know common stroke symptoms.

The data came from the 2017 National Health Interview Survey, an annual survey3 that uses a nationally representative U.S. sample. Researchers looked at a targeted young adult subset (9,844 individuals) of the more than 24,000 total participants. 

Over 30% of young adults—nearly 1 in 3—did not know all five stroke symptoms. Specifically, 28.9% didn't know all five symptoms, while 2.7% failed to recognize at least one symptom. The fact that nearly one-third of young adults lack awareness of the top signs of stroke is important because as mentioned before, stroke incidence is up in young adults. 

In fact, stroke incidence and hospitalization rates are clearly diverging by age. In the past few decades, research shows that older adults (greater than 65 years of age) have experienced a 22 to 28% reduction in hospitalization for ischemic stroke, while a steep rise of almost 44% was seen in young adult (ages 25 to 44 years) strokes and hospitalizations. 

Nasir explains, "Our results show that novel strategies are required at the population level to increase symptom awareness among young adults, where we have found a higher-risk population with substantial variations in symptom recognition." 

Important socio-demographic differences were also observed in this study, as certain groups demonstrated significantly less awareness of stroke symptoms. These included Hispanics, those not born in the U.S., and individuals with a lower level of education. Having five high-risk traits (being non-White, not born in the U.S., low income, uninsured, and having a high school education or less) increased one's odds of not knowing all five stroke symptoms by almost four times.

Commenting on the inequities revealed by the study, Nasir said, "We hope that highlighting the continued impact of current health disparities may advance focused public health strategies and educational initiatives to increase awareness of and appropriate response to stroke symptoms."

Lastly, an emergency medical services (EMS) response (i.e., calling 911 for an ambulance) was assessed in this study. Surprisingly, almost 3% of young adults said they would not call 911 if they saw someone experiencing signs of a stroke.