Friday, October 3, 2025

‘Beauty parlor stroke syndrome’: health threat while getting hair done more common than you think

Rinse — and wince?

Having your hair shampooed and your scalp massaged is a key — and typically relaxing — part of any salon appointment. The amount of time spent at the special sink usually depends on the extent of the cleansing and conditioning treatment.

The problem is that tilting your head back in a salon basin for too long can compress or tear the vertebral arteries that supply blood to the brain, potentially leading to a life-changing stroke.

It’s a common enough phenomenon that it has earned a colloquial name — “beauty parlor stroke syndrome” (BPSS).

A recent review of medical literature — published in May in The American Journal of Emergency Medicine — identified 54 cases of BPSS over 48 years. Forty-two originated at salons, while dental procedures resulted in eight cases. Other settings were responsible for the remaining four incidents.

“Within the panorama of neurological urgencies, (BPSS) stands out not only for its unique etiology but also for the commonplace nature of its trigger — neck hyperextension during salon hair washes,” the researchers wrote.

A tear in the vertebral arteries, which run along the back of the neck, or the carotid arteries, on the sides of the neck, can turn into a stroke when blood entering the injured wall forms a clot that travels to the brain.

That’s what Elizabeth Smith said happened to her in 2014, two weeks after getting her hair done at a California blow-dry bar.

“I go to sleep wondering, will I wake up tomorrow?” Smith told reporters after suing the salon.

She said the hyperextension of her neck at the shampoo bowl “cut” her vertebral artery.

The cervical artery dissection triggered an “unsteady gait,” the “loss of motor skills” in her left hand and impairment in her left eye, according to her lawsuit.

BPSS symptoms vary based on the extent of the vascular damage, but can include:

Sudden paralysis or weakness on one side of the body, especially the face, arm or leg
Dizziness or vertigo
Loss of balance and trouble walking
Blurred or double vision in one or both eyes
Headache
Nausea
Vomiting
Difficulty breathing, chewing or swallowing
Slurred speech

In the medical review, the researchers reported that the most common BPSS symptoms were dizziness, balance problems and headache.

“Outcomes ranged from full recovery to persistent symptoms and death,” the researchers wrote. “Follow-up data was sparse.”

BPSS was initially described in four patients in 1974 — the term was coined nearly two decades later, in 1993, by a New York neurologist reporting on five cases.

The risk of BPSS doesn’t mean you have to cut out or cut back on salon visits.

“When going to the salon, the neck needs to be supported so as not to require significant extension backward,” triple-board-certified New York neurologist Dr. Jeremy M. Liff told The Post. “Alternatively, have the hair washed or rinsed in an upright position.”

A rolled towel or a cushion placed under the neck can provide support as you tilt your head back. Your stylist could also use a handheld sprayer on your hair as you sit upright.

Be sure to speak up immediately if there’s any discomfort.

https://nypost.com/2025/10/03/health/beauty-parlor-stroke-syndrome-is-more-common-than-you-think/

One surprising factor hikes your risk of a deadly ‘superbug’ infection

Drug-resistant superbugs are sickening American hospital patients at an alarming rate — but the reality of these “nightmare bacteria” infections is even worse than the headlines suggest.

Last week, researchers at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced a “shocking” increase in drug-resistant CRE infections — which tripled from 2019 to 2023 and caused an estimated 1,100 deaths.

But the ugly truth is dirty hospitals are killing patients, regardless of whether it’s CRE or some other germ.

CRE is short for Carbapenem-resistant Enterobacterales, a class of bacteria new to the US since 2001 that can only be treated with IV antibiotics, not oral medications.

Half the time not even IV medications work, and the patient dies.

According to the CDC report, CRE spreads in hospitals because health-care workers skip cleaning their hands in between patients, while hospitals fail to scrub rooms and sanitize medical equipment — even devices inserted in patients to diagnose them. Ugh!

That’s the same way that common bacterial infections spread from patient to patient in hospitals, causing 100,000 deaths a year.

CRE is merely a red flag. The problem is far bigger than one germ.

And as other common bacteria evolve to become more drug-resistant, going into a hospital will be an increasingly dangerous prospect — unless our health-care system cleans itself up.

Literally: Cleanliness is the first line of defense to protect patients from killer germs.

But many hospitals refuse to make it a priority.

Shockingly, the No. 1 predictor of which patients get a hospital infection is what room or bed they’re assigned to.

Not their age, not the illness that sent them to the hospital — their room number.

If a patient is placed in a room where the preceding patient had an infection, the risk of getting infected goes up almost fivefold, according a major study of New York City hospitals published in the American Journal of Infection Control.

In other words, the previous patient was discharged, but the germs were left behind on the bedrail, call button, curtain and mattress — all invisibly lurking to sicken the next patient.

Clostridium difficile, C. diff for short, is the most prevalent hospital-spread infection, killing nearly 30,000 Americans a year.

It’s caused by oral-fecal contamination. Traces of one patient’s feces get into another patient’s mouth.

How could such a gross thing happen in a hospital?

Easy — placing the patient in a bed with a dirty mattress. Beds are cauldrons of infection-causing germs.

Emory University scientists tracked the fate of patients placed in a bed where a preceding patient — even 90 days before — had C. diff: The risk of infection more than doubles.

Mattresses absorb bodily fluids and are usually only inspected once a year.

Here’s the bottom line: The CDC has been sounding the alarm about drug-resistant infections for years now.

Former CDC Director Tom Frieden coined the phrase “nightmare bacteria” about CRE back in 2013.

Well, the nightmare is still spreading — and one of its chief causes can be remedied if only the agency musters the will to do it.

The CDC should be setting rigorous, detailed hospital cleaning standards, and ditch the vaguely worded, clearly ineffective blather it calls “guidelines.”

Are you listening, Secretary Kennedy?

Until 1970, hospitals routinely tested surfaces for bacterial contamination.

Then the American Hospital Association and the CDC jointly advised them to stop that routine testing, reasoning that any patient infections could be treated with antibiotics, which had come into wide use.

Those treatments are no longer enough: The drugs don’t work against many of the superbugs, including CRE.

Lax hospital hygiene is dooming patients to sickness and death — whether they’re infected by a new, rare organism or a by a common one like MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staph) or C. diff.

As drug resistance increases, the danger will soar unless hospitals change their ways.

New Yorkers should be especially outraged.

New York state is a national health-care capital, yet hospital infection rates are higher here than the national average, according to the state Department of Health.

Not good for patients and lousy for business.

If you’re visiting a loved one in the hospital, skip the flowers, cards and candy.

Instead, bring a canister of bleach wipes and scrub down the bedrail, call button and other surfaces everyone touches.

Sounds ridiculously basic, but it works: A study at the Mayo Clinic showed that cleaning high-touch surfaces around the bed once a day with a bleach wipe reduced C. diff infections by 86%.

That simple step could save a life.

Question is, why isn’t every hospital doing it?

Betsy McCaughey is a former lieutenant governor of New York and co-founder of SAVENYC.org.

https://nypost.com/2025/10/03/opinion/factor-hikes-your-risk-of-deadly-superbug-infection/

Fact Checking a 'Fact Checker' on Medicaid for Illegals

Jerry Rogers

@JerryRogersShow

@melissa_goldin

you know that your piece is a half-truth. Right? And a half-truth is a lie. Focus on these Facts: Some Blue states have restructured budgets to let them expand Medicaid coverage to Illegal Aliens who should not qualify, while still drawing from federal Medicaid matching funds. For example, California (and other states) tax hospitals & insurers, then recycle the $$$ back through Medicaid payments. That inflated spending triggers more federal matching funds, which are then used to give coverage to illegals. California, Oregon, Washington, Illinois, NY, & NJ offer full health coverage to illegals. On paper, it's a 'state program', but in practice, these programs rely on the same infrastructure & funding flows as Medicaid. The result is Medicaid $$$, both state and federal, are being used directly and indirectly to pay for the health care of illegal aliens. Your piece below needs a Warning Label that reads: 'Mostly Wrong but Helpful to Democrats'. FACT FOCUS: Democrats did not shut down the government to give health care to 'illegal immigrants' https://apnews.com/article/fact-c

https://x.com/JerryRogersShow/status/1973738323093975219

Trump Threatens Funding for Chicago, Portland in Shutdown Fight

The White House announced Friday it was withholding more than $2 billion for transportation projects in Chicago and examining ways to reduce federal funding to Portland, Oregon, the latest bid to use the shutdown to target political opponents in Democratic strongholds.

White House budget director Russell Vought said in a post on X early Friday that “$2.1 billion in Chicago infrastructure projects — specifically the Red Line Extension and the Red and Purple Modernization Project — have been put on hold to ensure funding is not flowing via race-based contracting.”

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-10-03/vought-suspends-2-billion-for-chicago-trains-in-shutdown-gambit

Novo Plans to Make Obesity Pill Available Online Once Approved

Novo Nordisk A/S plans to launch its new obesity pill on telehealth sites like Ro and WeightWatchers as soon as it’s approved. The move is an attempt to win back market share from rival Eli Lilly and Co., which has pulled ahead in the weight-loss drug race.

“There’s certainly awareness of Ozempic, and increasingly with Wegovy — and we can build on that,” said Dave Moore, Novo’s US operations chief in an interview at Bloomberg’s New York headquarters. Making the pill available online, where so many consumers are purchasing weight-loss shots already, “allows us to to have the awareness at a different level,” he said.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-10-03/novo-plans-to-make-obesity-pill-available-online-once-approved

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