{"id":9371,"date":"2025-09-09T07:26:06","date_gmt":"2025-09-09T07:26:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/9371\/"},"modified":"2025-09-09T07:26:06","modified_gmt":"2025-09-09T07:26:06","slug":"former-dublin-footballer-recalls-health-scare-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/9371\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Dublin footballer recalls health scare \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

One morning three years ago, Siobh\u00e1n McGrath woke up feeling more tired than usual. She was 34 at the time and playing on the Dublin<\/a> senior Gaelic football team, so she put it down to a few \u201ctough training sessions\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut then, as I started to try and get dressed, I started to have little speed wobbles,\u201d she recalled. \u201cSo I was trying to get my leggings on, I was trying to put my T-shirt on and I noticed that cognitively, I wasn\u2019t all there. My fingers were going in different directions.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was trying to do different tasks like open a window because I felt I needed air. I couldn\u2019t do it. I tried to turn off my alarm, [but] I couldn\u2019t put that sequence of numbers together.\u201d<\/p>\n

At this stage, Ms McGrath knew something was wrong. But she never thought someone as young, fit and healthy as she was would have a stroke<\/a>.<\/p>\n

She rang her mam, which she acknowledges now was not the best course of action for someone experiencing stroke symptoms.<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone needs to be aware that any person at any time can have a stroke and that they really need to act fast when they see the symptoms,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Ms McGrath was speaking in advance of a public awareness campaign called Every Second Counts, highlighting that the second you suspect a stroke is the second to dial 999 or 112. <\/p>\n

\"SiobhánSiobh\u00e1n McGrath of Dublin (right) attempts to block Orla Finn of Cork during the 2018 All-Ireland senior football championship final at Croke Park. Photograph: Dara Mac D\u00f3naill <\/p>\n

Prof R\u00f3n\u00e1n Collins, HSE<\/a> national clinical lead for stroke, said there needs to be an improvement in public awareness of stroke. It is much more widespread than stereotypes suggest.<\/p>\n

\u201cMost of our treatments for stroke are very time dependent,\u201d he said. \u201cThe sooner you treat it, the better the neurological recovery will be.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour brain cells do not do well without oxygen. So every 10 minutes, you\u2019re losing a couple of million brain cells. The sooner you act, the better the treatments are going to work.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Prof Collins, stroke is the most common cause of adult neurological disability in Ireland, with one in four people having a stroke in their lifetime.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is true that most strokes occur in older people, about three-quarters of them, but that means a quarter occur in younger people too,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

\"ProfProf R\u00f3n\u00e1n Collins, HSE national clinical lead for stroke; Minister for Health Jennifer Carroll MacNeill; and stroke survivor Siobh\u00e1n McGrath at the launch of the HSE’s Every Second Counts campaign. Photograph: Sasko Lazarov\/Photocall Ireland <\/p>\n

The HSE also published a new report entitled Early Supported Discharge for Stroke 2022 to 2023.<\/p>\n

Early supported discharge (ESD) refers to measures put in place for stroke survivors so they can leave hospital earlier. It involves therapy, social work and nursing support at home. More than 800 people benefited from the initiative in 2023.<\/p>\n

Ciara Breen, the health and social care professions lead at the National Clinical Programme for Stroke, said this gives patients an opportunity to be at home during their recovery.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe know they\u2019ll recover faster where they\u2019re supported by their family, where they\u2019re sleeping in their own bed, eating their own food and yet they\u2019re still having access to this really specialist team of professionals who provide advice,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Ms Breen added that it\u2019s also a \u201cbig win\u201d for the health service as it frees up capacity within the acute hospital system quicker, allowing more patients to receive timely care.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt enables us to treat more people in stroke units as well, which is where we know the best outcome for them is at that acute stage. At that early stage, that\u2019s where somebody needs to be in [hospital],\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe big win (in terms of ESD) is that people learn skills faster in their own home. It happens much faster and much smoother because you\u2019re back home, where you want to be.\u201d<\/p>\n

For more information see: hse.ie\/stroke<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One morning three years ago, Siobh\u00e1n McGrath woke up feeling more tired than usual. She was 34 at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9372,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[9821,61,60,9820,112],"class_list":["post-9371","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-dara-mac-donaill","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-mam","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9371","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9371"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9371\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9372"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9371"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9371"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9371"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}