Game of Thrones Neuro Note #2
"Game of Thrones"
In the article, "A Battle For My Life" by Emilia Clarke, Clarke comes clean about suffering from a Subarachnoid hemorrhage after filming the first season of Game of Thrones. Emilia grew up in Oxford, a city in England. She knew from age four that she wanted to grow up and become an actor. She tried out for every play growing up in school. She stated she would sometimes get dizzy and pass out at practice, but that it was manageable and she thought it came with the stress of actor life. At the age of fourteen, she suffered from a migraine that kept her in bed for a couple days. Looking back, she thinks it was warning signs of what was coming in her near future.
Emilia was in her early twenties, when she was cast in the role of Daenerys Targaryen. She was working out with her personal trainer to relieve stress when she started experiencing a bad headache and fatigue. On her break, she stated that she crawled to the bathroom where she described her brain feeling like it was being squeezed by a rubber band. There was a woman in the bathroom who called for help. All she remembers, is being in excruciating pain and being wheeled into the hospital. The MRI showed she had had a subarachnoid hemorrhage. The surgeon informed her she would need a minimally invasive surgery to stop the bleed.
A subarachnoid hemorrhage is bleeding between your brain and the thin tissues that cover and protect it. The bleeding happens below the arachnoid layer. Subarachnoid hemorrhage is usually caused by head trauma or a ruptured brain aneurysm. This is very common in people ages 40 to 60 years old and 85% of non-traumatic cases are from a ruptured aneurysm. In Emilia's case, she was born with two aneurysms and one ruptured later in life. A lot of people go through life unaware they have an aneurysm because they either do not rupture or something happens causing it to rupture.
In neuro aspects, we are learning about strokes, different types of strokes, and what causes them. I researched what a subarachnoid hemorrhage is to expand my knowledge and have a better understanding of what I am currently learning about. I think it is beneficial for everyone to know the signs of a hemorrhage and how to seek help.
References
Subarachnoid Hemorrhage (SAH). Cleveland Clinic. (2023). https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/diseases/17871-subarachnoid-hemorrhage-sah
Clarke, E. (2019, March). A Battle For My Life. The New Yorker. https://www.newyorker.com/culture/personal-history/emilia-clarke-a-battle-for-my-life-brain-aneurysm-surgery-game-of-thrones?
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