Stroke is not only caused by high blood pressure.

Stroke is the third leading cause of death after cancer and cardiovascular disease and the leading cause of disability.

Not only that, the cost of treating stroke is also very expensive, in the US about 70 billion USD for the cost of care and treatment of stroke every year.

The dangers of stroke are well known, one of the most common causes in the community is high blood pressure. However, stroke is not only caused by high blood pressure, we need to have a more comprehensive view.

Why stroke?

Stroke or cerebrovascular accident is a disease that occurs suddenly, due to rupture or blockage of blood vessels in the brain, causing damage to brain tissue, thereby losing localized brain functions. If the level of brain damage is large, it causes coma and death.

Localized neurological lesions include facial distortion, hemiplegia, hemisensory disturbance, difficulty speaking, inability to understand words (language disorder), balance disorder, blurred vision...

Hypertension and cardiovascular complications.

There are two main types of stroke: cerebral infarction and cerebral hemorrhage. Causes of cerebral hemorrhage include high blood pressure, ruptured aneurysm, ruptured arteriovenous malformation (AVM), cerebral hemorrhage due to disorders of blood clotting factors (thrombocytopenia, liver failure, dengue fever, disseminated intravascular coagulation...).

Causes of cerebral infarction or cerebral ischemia: due to arterial thrombosis, which is a blockage formed in the cerebral artery, causing gradual narrowing and blockage, usually due to atherosclerosis, a few due to arteriosclerosis, moyamoya genetic disease, arteritis...

Due to blockage of the cerebral artery, the embolism can come from the heart or from the artery and blow up to the brain. Some of the above causes are congenital (arteriovenous malformation), some are genetic (moyamoya), and most are formed during life.

The interaction of the body with environmental factors, space, time and biological characteristics of the individual can gradually form the cause of the disease as above, which are indirect factors causing the disease, medically called risk factors.

40 - 45% of strokes are not related to blood pressure.

Hypertension is both a cause of hemorrhagic stroke and a risk factor for ischemic stroke. In hemorrhagic stroke, 60-70% of strokes are related to hypertension, while in ischemic stroke, 50-60% are related to hypertension. Thus, there are still about 40-45% of strokes that are not due to hypertension, which is a fairly large proportion.

However, in the community, it is often misunderstood that if I do not have high blood pressure, I will not have a stroke. The above misconceptions are mainly due to excessive propaganda about high blood pressure, while there is a complete lack of information about many other risks that cause stroke.

Some other common major risk factors with a high rate of causing stroke are: folic acid deficiency 50-75%, atherosclerosis 30-50%, dyslipidemia 30-45%, smoking addiction 25-35%, hyperhomocysteinemia 20-30%, atrial fibrillation 15-25%, alcoholism 15-25%, diabetes 12-20%, obesity 12-20%, gout 7-10%.

These are modifiable risk factors for stroke, the risk of the disease is higher if the patient has many risk factors at the same time. We can completely survey, evaluate and control them.

If we can control high blood pressure, reduce folic acid, diabetes, dyslipidemia, atrial fibrillation, vitamin B6 and B12 deficiency; recently many studies have mentioned the role of antioxidants; at the same time eliminate heavy drinking, smoking, obesity, salty food, lack of exercise... then we can completely avoid stroke.

Thus, it is necessary to avoid the misconception that people without high blood pressure are not at risk of stroke.

For people over 50 years old, those with risk factors for stroke need to go to stroke centers, with specialists and specialized tests to fully assess the risk factors and specific causes of stroke for each person.

On that basis, if we propose specific and early remedies for each person, we can completely avoid getting a stroke.

According to Health and Life