Hailey Bieber is opening up about a recent health scare and what doctors believe contributed to her having a mini-stroke.
via People:
In a lengthy video posted to YouTube on Wednesday, the 25-year-old supermodel detailed her March 10 health scare and subsequent hospitalization, sharing that her doctors came “to the conclusion of why they think I had the blood clot in the first place.”
“One was that I had just recently started birth control pills, which I should have never been on because I am somebody who suffers from migraines anyway,” she said. “And I just did not talk to my doctors about this.”
Warning her followers to learn from her mistake, she continued: “So ladies, if you suffer from bad migraines and you plan on being on birth control pills, make sure you tell your doctor because having a stroke is a potential side effect from birth control pills.”
According to research done by Loyola Medicine stroke specialists, neurologists Sarkis Morales-Vidal, MD, and Jose Biller, MD, hormonal contraceptive consumption can be considered one of the stroke risk factors, although the chance of it happening is small.
“However, in women with other stroke risk factors, the risk seems higher and, in most cases, oral contraceptive use should be discouraged,” Dr. Morales-Vidal and Dr. Biller wrote in the medical journal Medlink Neurology, adding that some of the risk factors include high blood pressure, smoking, and migraines — especially migraines with sensory disturbances called aura (such as flashes of light and tingling in the hands or face).
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Last month, Bieber was hospitalized in Palm Springs for a medical emergency. She later shared in a statement she was admitted to the hospital with stroke-like symptoms caused by a blood clot in her brain.
While trying to explain the situation in “her own words,” she also noted other contributing factors to her recent health scare, including her recent COVID diagnosis and her traveling activities.
After being discharged from the hospital, she visited UCLA for a follow-up treatment, where she was diagnosed with a PFO (a small opening in the heart that usually closes after birth) after undergoing a transcranial doppler, a “more accurate” and “in-depth” ultrasound test used to detect strokes caused by blood clots.
She was diagnosed with a Grade 5 PFO – the “highest grade” possible. The small hole measured between 12 and 13 millimeters.
At that point, Bieber said she was just “grateful” to know what had caused the stroke. Typically, a blood clot is filtered by the heart and absorbed into the lungs. Due to her PFO, the blood clot “escaped” through her heart and traveled to her brain.
Bieber then underwent a procedure to close the PFO under her doctor’s recommendation. A small, button-like object was inserted through the femoral vein in her groin to close the small hole. Eventually, her heart tissue will grow back around the closure device.
She shared that the PFO closure procedure went “very smoothly” and she’s recovering fully.
Bieber is now taking aspirin and blood thinners daily and shared that she is no longer suffering from any related symptoms. At the end of the video she posted on Wednesday, she also shared a special shout-out to the doctors who helped treat her throughout the process.
That sounds like a terrifying ordeal — and we wonder just how much COVID contributed to it.
