A doctor faces a rare and life-threatening type of stroke due to a chronic cough that lasts 4 years

A chronic cough caused a doctor to suffer a rare and particularly deadly type of stroke when she was 42.

After four years of persistent coughing, occurring nonstop for four to six months a year, Dr. Shaybah Ansari Ali, a rheumatologist at Northwestern Medicine Delnor Hospital in Illinois, said she had a stroke.

Tune into FOX-32 now for interview with Dr. Shaiba Ansari-Ali about how having a stroke changed how she treats her own patients. pic.twitter.com/gDakJns5xE

— NM Media Relations (@NMHC_News) May 17, 2021

Dr. Shaiba told TODAY that she began to feel as if the room was spinning in all directions, and then told her husband that “the room is spinning…I feel very dizzy.”

After going to the bathroom and vomiting, Dr. Shaybah lay motionless on the floor. Her husband thought that she was unconscious, but she was awake and aware of everything that was happening around her, a condition called locked-in syndrome, in which the patient is awake and conscious but unable to verbally communicate with others, in other words it is almost complete paralysis, Cognition and mental function are not affected.

She suspected a stroke and said she was able to move again after getting a blood thinner in the emergency room.

The cough ruptured the lining of the artery that goes to the brain along the back of the neck, causing a life-threatening health crisis.

Dr. Shaybah’s vertebral artery was under great pressure from a chronic cough. The rupture obstructed blood flow to her brain, eventually causing a stroke.

Dr. Shaybah noted, “About 85% of people with this type of stroke die before they reach the hospital.”

"When my husband saw me, he thought I was unconscious, but I knew exactly what was happening. On the inside, I was super funny, funnier than I've ever been. I was Ryan Reynolds in 'Deadpool'"

Thank you to Dr. Shaiba Ansari-Ali for sharing her story.https://t.co/xUyiBtFWHH

— A. Pawlowski (@LaVarsovienne) June 10, 2021

Over the next two months after the stroke, Dr. Shaybah underwent rehabilitation in the hospital, and then at her home.

Her cough, which led to her stroke, is now under control, and she will have to take blood thinners for the rest of her life.

Dr. Shaiba didn’t think her chronic cough could lead to a more serious medical problem.

Dr. Shaiba, author of When a Doctor Has a Stroke, shared her recovery story with TODAY, having this rare condition in July 2016.

Shayba noted that nearly five years after her injury, she had some residual effects from a stroke. “When I’m tired, my speech becomes distorted, I will start to limp a little and I will choke on food more because I can’t swallow well.”

Source: Business Insider