Why Are Strokes Felling COVID-19 Patients? We Asked an Oregon Expert.

The results can be catastrophic, leaving patients with limited speech and motor function.

Dr. Helmi Lutsep. (Courtesy of OHSU)
By WW Staff

WW presents "Distant Voices," a daily video interview for the era of social distancing. Our reporters are asking Portlanders what they're doing during quarantine.

Among the many unpleasant symptoms of the COVID-19 virus, one is singularly terrifying: a stroke.

As many as 8% of COVID patients are experiencing strokes, the blood clots that cut off oxygen to the brain. The results can be catastrophic, leaving patients with limited speech and motor function. And it's not just the elderly who face this fate: Hospitals in COVID-19 hot spots are seeing young, otherwise healthy people felled by strokes.

We found that prospect alarming. So like any good hypochondriac, we went to the doctor.

In this case that meant Dr. Helmi Lutsep, a professor of neurology at Oregon Health & Science University. An editorial board member of the journal Stroke, she may be the state's leading expert on the medical emergency.

In an interview with WW Editor Mark Zusman, Lutsep discussed what to look for, what doctors are seeing nationally, and why so many more people are dead this year in Oregon than usual.

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