GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Zosia Wasylewski, 14, was in her high school math class when she started to lose feeling in her leg, then her arm, then she couldn't talk.
Wasylewski was having a stroke.
The Boyne City teen was rushed to a local hospital where she underwent a CT scan and an MRI. Doctors consulted with Spectrum Health Helen DeVos Children's Hospital, and they decided to transfer their young stroke patient to Grand Rapids.
“Pediatric stroke affects maybe 25 kids in 100,000. It is very uncommon,” said Dr. Justin Singer, the director of vascular neurosurgery for Spectrum Health Medical Group.
At Helen Devos Children's Hospital, Wasylewski became the youngest patient to receive a a mechanical thrombectomy—a minimally invasive procedure to remove the clot from the teen's brain.
Two days after the thrombectomy, Wasylewski was already well on the road the recovery. Within five days, she was back at school.
“Stroke is pretty rare for the pediatric population, but you have to be on the lookout for it because it can always happen,” said Dr. Daniel Fain, the section chief for pediatric neurology at Helen DeVos Children’s Hospital. “Just like for adults, time is brain.”
►Read more about Wasylewski's story at the Spectrum HealthBeat.
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