Sometimes it seems like blood clots rule my life. It was a clot that caused my stroke in 2002, precipitated by the autoimmune clotting disorder antiphospholipid syndrome (APS). APS has a nasty tendency to “re-thrombose” — that’s the medical jargon I read, soon after my stroke, telling me  I was highly likely to have another. […]

  Blood clots are no joke. The toll is staggering: More than two million people in the US suffer serious blood clots each year, from deep vein thrombosis (DVT), pulmonary embolism (PE) or stroke. Almost half a million of them die. The most important way to protect yourself is to know your risks and manage […]

A research team at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), has identified a genetic mutation that is strongly associated with a typical form of migraine headache—migraine with aura.  The research “puts us one step closer to understanding the molecular pathway to pain in migraine,” according to Louis J. Ptáček, senior investigator on the study […]

For those of us who take the blood thinner warfarin (brand name Coumadin) or similar drugs to prevent prevent clots, one of the scariest of life’s scenarios is an accident or fall. It’s especially scary for patients like me who, because of an acute tendency to clot, must keep their blood extra thin to prevent […]

New research suggests that statins, traditionally used for cholesterol lowering, could be used in the management of patients with antiphospholipid syndrome (APS), a blood clotting disorder that causes miscarriages, deep vein thromboses, and strokes. The new research shows that the statin fluvastatin could reduce the inflammatory proteins that are elevated in patients with APS. The […]

Professor Anisur Rahman of University College, London, discusses the latest thinking on Antiphospholipid Syndrome, its causes and treatments in a 35-minute lecture delivered October 10, 2012, at the Royal Society of Medicine. The easy-to-understand video presentation, with slides, is available here.  (http://bit.ly/VORFdC) It’s a great resources to help educate physicians, patients, and their families. Antiphospholipid […]

It’s a pleasure to have four of my stories published over the past few months in three different anthologies. Each story, in its own way, explores the theme of traveling with chronic illness. That’s something I think about often as a stroke survivor and autoimmune patient chained to a steady diet of blood thinners to […]

This month the National Stroke Association is sharing information about migraine and stroke, including an article from the Better Health Channel on how to tell the difference between the two. I had mild migraines (with aura) for 20 years, which I dismissed as a mere annoyance. Until I had a stroke at 48, and learned […]

I was slammed out of the blue ten years ago by a stroke that could have been prevented if I’d know the facts. Don’t let that happen to you or someone you love. Today, June 9, is APS awareness day – APS, the acronym for Antiphospholipid Syndrome, the blood clotting disorder that caused my stroke. […]

  Am I Crazy? As an autoimmune patient with APS, as a stroke  survivor on blood thinners, people sometimes ask why I travel to places teeming with opportunities for disaster. “Places where medical care is thin, the water is often unsafe and the food chancy; places with infectious diseases, malarial mosquitoes, venomous snakes and the […]