FAST awareness

Mark-Vivian-2The week of 9–15 Septem­ber is Stroke Aware­ness Week. Wheth­er you are close to people who have suffered from a stroke or not, this is a very ser­i­ous busi­ness: some 9,000 New Zeal­anders are vic­tims every year. Most of these cases are preventable.

As people in busi­ness, our health can some­times slide when we are faced with oper­a­tion­al chal­lenges. Our reg­u­lar gym attend­ance or oth­er phys­ic­al activ­ity is usu­ally the first to slide in favour of late-night net­work­ing or increas­ing work­loads (wheth­er for growth or survival).

Intro­duce that to that a diet high in con­veni­ence and pre-pack­aged foods, and add those factors to high blood pres­sure in the over-50 age group, and sud­denly you’re a great can­did­ate for a stroke.

In June’s issue I wrote about busi­ness suc­ces­sion: hav­ing a plan in place to exit your busi­ness either through fam­ily or sale. Ensur­ing a plan for your busi­ness is not only essen­tial for optim­al oper­a­tion in the owner’s absence. Plan­ning for growth and busy times by adding extra staff when needed – or even tak­ing on a part­ner as a way to ease the pres­sure – is also bene­fi­cial. While stress is not the single con­trib­ut­ing factor to strokes, the out­side causes of stress are issues that can mount up over time and cause real and ser­i­ous health problems.

Strokes are usu­ally the res­ult of a com­bin­a­tion of these issues. Get­ting your blood pres­sure checked reg­u­larly, stop­ping smoking, exer­cising fre­quently, eat­ing a healthy diet and con­trolling your weight are essen­tial ways to reduce your risk of a stroke.

We don’t give enough atten­tion to pre­vent­ing strokes, pos­sibly because we think of stroke as an older person’s issue,” says Mark Vivi­an, CEO of the Stroke Found­a­tion of New Zea­l­and. “In fact, 25 per­cent of strokes hap­pen to work­ing-age Kiwis.”

The Stroke Found­a­tion has been in oper­a­tion for over 30 years, pro­mot­ing pub­lic aware­ness about the risk factors for strokes and how to recog­nise the symp­toms. Out­side of their blood pres­sure aware­ness cam­paign in Octo­ber each year, the found­a­tion encour­ages the shar­ing of the FAST check to identi­fy the onset of a stroke:

Face – SMILE (is one side droopy?)

Arms – RAISE BOTH ARMS (is one side weak?)

Speech – SPEAK A SIMPLE SENTENCE (slurred? Unable to?)

Time – Lost time could be lost brain, so get to hos­pit­al FAST

In addi­tion to this, the found­a­tion helps stroke sur­viv­ors through life-enhan­cing rehab­il­it­a­tion and sup­port groups, and is also exper­i­enced in post-stroke care strategies for those affected, includ­ing carers and fam­ily mem­bers. “The found­a­tion is a very well dis­trib­uted organ­isa­tion: we can provide free sup­port to indi­vidu­als and fam­il­ies affected by a stroke just about any­where in the coun­try,” adds Vivian.

If you think someone near you is suf­fer­ing from a stroke, remem­ber to run through the FAST check above and then dial 111 imme­di­ately – loss of time could mean a loss of brain function.

 

Avatar photo

About Peta Walker

Peta is Fish­Head’s enter­prise writer. A born and bred Wel­ling­to­ni­an, Walk­er is own­er of BW Chartered Account­ants and a long-term busi­ness adviser — she is cur­rently fight­ing all the usu­al account­ing ste­reo­types.. and win­ning. Lov­ing long walks in the hills, her long-term ambi­tion is to walk the entire Te Araroa walk­way: at about 100 kilo­metres per year this is a 30-year pro­ject. She lives on a Makara life­style prop­erty that is also home to Pester and Lester the chick­ens, and cows French, Door, Blue and Vein.

About Peta Walker

Avatar photo Peta is FishHead's enterprise writer. A born and bred Wellingtonian, Walker is owner of BW Chartered Accountants and a long-term business adviser - she is currently fighting all the usual accounting stereotypes.. and winning. Loving long walks in the hills, her long-term ambition is to walk the entire Te Araroa walkway: at about 100 kilometres per year this is a 30-year project. She lives on a Makara lifestyle property that is also home to Pester and Lester the chickens, and cows French, Door, Blue and Vein.

Connect

View all Posts

You must be logged in to post a comment Login