No one needed to tell Carol DeBenedictis that a stroke is a medical emergency requiring immediate action.  Her father had died of a stroke just six months earlier.  So last November when she noticed her mother slurring her speech, she wasted no time getting her to the closest emergency room.

Carol's knowledge and alertness may have saved her 75-year-old mother's life and almost certainly reduced the severity of her brain injury.  Her mother, Mary Cullen Stanley of Norristown, received a medication called tissue-Plasminogen Activator (t-PA), which can arrest the effects of stroke by dissolving clots that block vital blood flow to the brain.  The medication is effective only if administered within three-hours following onset of a stroke.
 
Each year, more than half a million Americans experience their first stroke.  Too often, symptoms are not recognized soon enough.  "I hadn't noticed I was slurring my speech.  I'm very grateful my daughter did," says Mary, who received three weeks of intensive physical, occupational and speech therapy as an inpatient at Bryn Mawr Rehab Hospital in Malvern after leaving the acute care hospital.

Carol attended therapy sessions to learn the exercises so she could help her mother continue them at home.

Mary's next stop on the road to recovery from her partial paralysis and lingering speech problems was outpatient therapy at nearby Shannondell in Audubon, where the Bryn Mawr Rehab Outpatient Network operates one of its seven centers for rehabilitation scattered throughout Philadelphia's western suburbs.  There, Mary continued to receive the full range of physical, occupational and speech therapy for an additional nine weeks.

Knowing that the chances of a second stroke are relatively high, Mary's family members remained vigilant for even the most subtle signs.  That vigilance served them well earlier this summer when Mary was rushed to the hospital again.  "She seemed confused and had trouble reciting the ABCs," Carol reports.  Her mother received fast-acting t-PA again to dissolve a clot that caused minor impairment of her throat muscles, which brought her back to Shannondell for a few weeks of speech therapy.

"Outpatient therapy at Shannondell has been so close and convenient, and we know Mom gets the same high-quality therapy there that she got as an inpatient at Bryn Mawr Rehab Hospital," Carol says.  "We feel fortunate that Bryn Mawr Rehab Hospital has such great experience in the specialty of stroke rehab."