On a quiet evening three years ago, Klugman had a massive headache. She popped some aspirin and went to bed. The headache was still there. She collapsed, unaware that a blood clot had clogged a vessel that delivers oxygen to her brain. A stroke hits hard and fast When nerve cells die, they can't be replaced, and the brain loses control over certain functions.
Death can occur with alarming frequency.
In fact, stroke is the third-leading cause of death in the United States, ranking behind diseases of the heart and cancer. And strokes killed approximately 160,000 people in 1997, according to the National Center for Health Statistics. After a stroke hits, doctors have roughly a three-hour window to begin treatment in an attempt to minimize the damage. Every second counts. But Klugman was lucky.