I do not want to suffer every time I go to the hair salon from here on out. Nor do I wish to offend my hairstylist by telling her why I have become so squirmy. It is very hard to find a hairstylist you like, and you can’t go around accusing them of attempted murder and still hope they’ll give you a decent hair cut. So I got in touch with an actual stroke expert in hopes he might talk some sense into me.

Richard Bernstein is the medical director of the Comprehensive Stroke Center at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago, and delivers his expertise to me in the patient-if-slightly brusque tone to which I am accustomed in every doctor I speak to. On a hunch I asked him if “beauty parlor stroke syndrome” is a real medical term, and he said no — getting one’s hair washed is merely one possibility in a range of options that cause the actual medical condition properly known as “vertebral artery dissection from hyperextension of the neck,” a considerably less grabby, though ultimately scarier name. What seems to happen is that certain movements of or pressures on the neck can result in a flap-like tear in the vertebral artery, which supplies blood to the brain. From there blood enters (and thereby thickens) the arterial wall, which can cause a blood clot, impeding blood flow and potentially causing a stroke.

It’s a phenomenon that isn’t altogether understood, Bernstein explained, but it can happen as a result of a wide variety of innocuous activities—not just getting your hair washed, but getting out of bed wrong in the morning, stretching, and even sneezing.

This is the type of thing doctors tell you to make you feel better, but it does not make me feel better. I am known to be a loud and forceful sneezer, like my father before me, frequently startling those in my vicinity. Was he telling me that I had to worry about getting a stroke every time I sneezed, too? Well, no, not really.

“It is so rare,” he said, “that it’s a waste of time to worry about it. It’s so unlikely, and there’s really nothing you can do to prevent it.” I asked him if he was sure—would putting extra towels under one’s neck at the salon do anything, maybe?

“Well, since getting up in the morning can make it happen, you better not sleep, either,” Bernstein replied. Point taken.

Having noticed in my reading that one sign of the artist formerly known as beauty parlor stroke syndrome is neck pain, I asked Bernstein what else people should be on the lookout for. He first explained that while neck pain can be a symptom of vertebral artery dissection, it’s extremely unlikely to be the dominant or the only one. “Neck pain can be caused by a great number of things,” he said. “That’s almost never a cause for concern.” More troubling are the other, more recognized symptoms of a stroke—facial slackness, paralysis on one side of the body, loss of coordination and/or loss of vision. If you’re experiencing any of those symptoms, you should definitely head to the ER, he said. And while it never hurts to protect one’s neck, Bernstein cautions that there is only so much that can be done toward prevention, and you’re likely at no greater risk in a hair salon than you are in your very own bed. That is supposed to be comforting, but I understand if it’s not.

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