A Stroke of Luck
January 24, 2015
“I made some changes after my first stroke, but after my second, I got really serious about it. There’s been a lot of improvement in the way I feel. I don’t get lightheaded and I feel stronger. I’ve even dropped a few pounds.”

Sherline Holmes didn’t think much of it when she developed a headache driving along SC 170 with her husband last fall. Then her eyesight became blurry. Not one to worry, she chalked it up to being tired.
It wasn’t until both her hands turned numb that she realized something was wrong.
“My fingers didn’t look good,” the 61-year-old Beaufort resident recalls. “They were stiff and curled up. I couldn’t grip anything.”
Holmes was suddenly overcome with a feeling of déjà vu. She had experienced the same symptoms two years earlier when she had her first stroke.
“My husband turned the car around and we went straight to the hospital,” Holmes says. “They told me I was really lucky that I had gotten there so quickly.”
Get a Vascular Checkup
Beaufort Memorial offers a complete vascular screening package for only $60 by appointment in Beaufort and at our Bluffton facility.
The low-cost screening includes:
- Carotid artery scan
- Abdominal aortic aneurysm scan
- Ankle-brachial index scan
Call 843-522-5635 to make an appointment, and let the scheduler know whether you would like to be screened in Beaufort or in Bluffton.

Most strokes are caused by a blood clot to the brain. If blood flow is blocked for longer than a few seconds, brain cells can die, causing lasting damage.
“Time is so important with a stroke,” Beaufort Memorial Hospital Stroke Coordinator Sheri O’Brien says. “The faster you can get diagnosed and treated, the better the outcome.”
According to treatment guidelines, clot-busting medication needs to be started within three to four and a half hours of the onset of symptoms to be effective. A study published last year in the journal “Stroke” showed that for every minute earlier stroke survivors receive the medication, they gain an average of nearly two more days of healthy life.
Rapid Response Saves Lives
As soon as Holmes arrived at the BMH Emergency Department, she was hooked up to a telemedicine cart that allows Beaufort physicians to consult with stroke specialists at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston.
BMH has partnered with MUSC to provide rapid evaluation and treatment to stroke patients through a Web-based initiative called REACH, or Remote Evaluation of Acute Ischemic Stroke. The telemedicine program offers participating hospitals immediate, round-the-clock access to MUSC stroke care experts who can provide urgent consultations by virtually examining patients and brain-imaging studies.
“We have great neurologists in Beaufort, but it’s difficult for them to be available immediately in our Emergency Department 24/7,” O’Brien says. “With the telemedicine cart, we can have access to an MUSC stroke specialist in 10 minutes.”
Beaufort Memorial’s ER typically handles 200-250 stroke cases a year. In the first four months of the program, emergency room physicians used the telemedicine cart 24 times.
After evaluating her condition, an MUSC physician confirmed Holmes was having an ischemic stroke. About 87 percent of all strokes are ischemic, caused when a blood vessel to the brain is blocked by a clot.
Holmes was immediately given tissue plasminogen activator (tPA) through an IV in her arm. The only FDA-approved treatment for ischemic strokes, it works by dissolving the clot and improving blood flow to the brain.
By the time Holmes was discharged from the hospital five days later, she had virtually no deficits. To remain healthy, she now takes a number of medications, including blood pressure-lowering drugs and a statin.
“Of modifiable stroke risk factors, the most prominent is hypertension,” says BMH neurologist Paul Mazzeo, MD, who treated Holmes after her second stroke. “By controlling that one risk factor, you can have a major effect on the risk of having a first or recurrent stroke.”
Chronic Companions
Stroke is the fourth leading cause of death in the United States. For African-Americans in South Carolina, it weighs in at No. 3, just behind heart disease.
“The two often go hand in hand, because the risk factors are the same,” O’Brien says. “High cholesterol, hypertension, diabetes, obesity, poor diet, inactivity and family history can cause both heart disease and stroke.”
Holmes is a perfect case in point. In July 2012, she had stents placed in her arteries to treat her coronary heart disease. Four months later, she had a stroke.
The pattern was repeated in 2014. She had a second percutaneous coronary intervention in July after suffering a heart attack. In October, she had another stroke.
“The second time it was worse,” Holmes says. “I was afraid I would have permanent damage. I know so many people who have had strokes that did not recover completely.”
Since her last stroke, Holmes has taken steps to improve her health. She is eating more fruit, salads and fish and has cut lunch meats from her diet. She switched baked chicken for fried chicken and yogurt for ice cream.”
“I don’t eat a lot of rice and pork anymore and I don’t use salt,” Holmes says. “I made some changes after my first stroke, but after my second, I got really serious about it.”
She also started exercising regularly. Every morning after breakfast, she goes through a series of exercises she learned at physical therapy to strengthen her muscles. Twice a week, she walks with her cane about a quarter-mile.
“There’s been a lot of improvement in the way I feel,” Holmes says. “I don’t get lightheaded and I feel stronger. I’ve even dropped a few pounds.”
The 411 on Stroke
The bad news: Each year, nearly 795,000 Americans suffer a new or recurrent stroke. The good news: 80 percent of all strokes are preventable.
The key to preventing a stroke is managing your risk factors, including high blood pressure, cigarette smoking, atrial fibrillation and physical inactivity. Of all the risks, hypertension is the one most important to control, according to the American Stroke Association. More than half of all strokes are caused by uncontrolled high blood pressure.
To lower your odds of having a stroke you should:
- Stop smoking. Lighting up makes just about all your other stroke risks worse.
- Lose weight. Your doctor can tell you your healthy weight.
- Drink less alcohol. Consume no more than two drinks a day for a man, one for a woman.
- Eat less salt. Limit sodium to 2,300 mg per day, and no more than 1,500 mg if you’re 52 or older, are African American or have diabetes or kidney disease.
- Improve your diet. Eat less sugar and red meat and more vegetables, fruits, whole grains, fish, poultry, beans, seeds and nuts.
- Exercise. Walk every day or find some kind of physical activity you enjoy.