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It is alarming to know that 25% of stroke sufferers die within a year, while half of them have to live with a lasting disability like speech problems, paralysis and personality changes.
However, researchers at Duke University in North Carolina have recently discovered that the extent to which sufferers recover is largely influenced by the support, good care as well as rehabilitation after a stroke episode.
In fact, they found that being in a stable marriage makes sufferers more likely to survive a stroke. Their findings showed that having a spouse to care for the sufferer boosts survival chances by up to 71%.
So how exactly does the saying “in sickness and in health” actually work in terms of stroke recovery?
In the study, the researchers looked into 2,351 individuals for an average of five years after suffering a stroke. While the results showed that having a caring spouse improved one’s chances of surviving stroke, the study also found that those who had experienced marriage troubles in the past or had been widowed were less likely to survive.
Divorced patients were 22% more likely to pass away after a stroke, while those whose spouses had passed away were 25% more likely to die compared to those in a stable marriage.
“’Faced with a stroke, we suspect that those with stable marriages draw from these protracted resources to better manage disease and prolong survival after experiencing a life-threatening event,” the researchers wrote in the Journal of American heart Association.
The researchers are hoping that a greater understanding of the relevance of current and past marital experiences on a person’s prognosis after a stroke may allow healthcare providers identify and treat patients who are potentially at high risk of dying after the stroke episode.
