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County launches multi-pronged stroke prevention and awareness campaign

Frederick News-Post - 5/8/2023

May 8—To combat a leading cause of death and disability in Frederick County, officials recently launched a stroke awareness and prevention campaign to mitigate the condition's affects.

The campaign includes collaborative efforts with local community groups, as well as a host of online materials to train county residents on the signs of stroke and how to respond.

Frederick County Executive Jessica Fitzwater was joined last week by officials from the county Division of Aging and Independence, the county health department and Frederick Health Hospital to announce the campaign, called "Stroke Smart Frederick."

"The purpose of Stroke Smart is to increase community awareness of the signs and symptoms of strokes, so more people seek care quickly, which will lead to fewer deaths and disabilities," Fitzwater said at the press conference.

Strokes are the result of blockages in blood supply to the brain and can cause lasting brain damage, disability and sometimes death, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In 2019, stroke was the third leading cause of death in Frederick County and the leading cause of long-term disability in the country, according to the county's stroke awareness website.

County Health Officer Dr. Barbara Brookmyer emphasized that those outcomes are preventable if people recognize the signs of stroke in someone early and immediately seek medical care.

Those signs include loss of balance, vision changes, facial drooping, severe headache, weakness and numbness of the arms, and trouble speaking or confusion.

Brookmyer added that strokes occur in a variety of people, and that misconceptions that they only affect older people or previous stroke victims might threaten a bystander's ability to react and help.

"Contrary to what people think, up to 75% [of strokes] are occurring in persons who never had a prior stroke ... and one in five strokes are occurring in persons who are 55 or younger," Brookmyer said.

The Stroke Smart campaign was spearheaded by Kathy Schey, director of the county's Division of Aging and Independence, who said she and other health officials were motivated when they sat down and reviewed the county's stroke data.

That data showed that in 2022, only a quarter of people who exhibited stroke symptoms arrived at the hospital within a treatment window of 4.5 hours, according to Schey.

Schey said the county, through the campaign, hopes to increase that statistic to 40% by the end of 2023.

Heather Kirby, chief population health officer at Frederick Health, said the hospital's emergency department sees roughly 45 patients for stroke each month.

Kirby recognized the importance of EMS employees and hospital staff in providing care as quickly as possible, which is aided by fast response times.

The Stroke Smart campaign is hosted on the Frederick County Health Department website, along other campaigns for COVID-19, Mpox and seasonal influenza.

It contains stroke training materials in Spanish and English, along with other information on prevention measures, signs and symptoms.

Schey said that although the goal of the campaign to reduce response times was "pretty audacious," she is hopeful about the effects of the team's collective efforts.

"This is such a joy to be able to say, 'Yes, in fact, this group really is looking at achieving a system level change, a population change,'" Schey said. "That is the definition of collective impact."

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