Julie Chin began suffering the beginnings of a stroke while anchoring the morning news for KJRH-TV over the weekend. “I’m sorry, something is going on with me this morning," Chin told her viewers.
A news anchor in Tulsa, Oklahoma, is on the road to recovery after suffering a stroke live on television over the weekend.
Julie Chin began suffering the beginnings of a stroke as she reported on NASA's since-canceled Artemis I launch during the morning news for KJRH-TV. She became visibly confused and began repeating words, later saying she first lost vision in one eye before her hand and arm went numb.
She then was unable to speak the words she could see on the teleprompter before her.
“I’m sorry, something is going on with me this morning," Chin told her viewers before a handing over the sow to a meteorologist for a weather update.
Chin’s symptoms came out of nowhere, but her quick-thinking colleagues immediately recognized something was wrong and called 911.
She was hospitalized for several days. Tests at the hospital showed she suffered the beginning of a stroke.
"I'm so glad to tell you I'm OK," Chin posted on Facebook. "The past few days are still a little bit of a mystery, but my doctors believe I had the beginnings of a stroke live on the air Saturday morning. Some of you witnessed it firsthand, and I'm so sorry that happened."
Strokes are the No. 5 leading cause of death in the United States, according to the American Stroke Association. They occur when a blood vessel carrying oxygen to the brain is either blocked or bursts.
“Strokes are definitely common in older people but strokes can happen in younger people and we are seeing this increasingly,” Dr. Rigved Tadwalker, a cardiologist at Providence Saint John's Health Center in California, told Inside Edition.
Oral contraceptive use and other factors can lead to strokes among younger women, according to Tadwalker, who noted, “Younger people now have risk factors for stroke that we didn’t see in the past.”
“This includes obesity, high blood pressure, diabetes, that puts them at risk,” he said.
Symptoms of a stroke include difficulty speaking or understanding what others are saying, paralysis or numbness in one’s face, arm or leg, difficulty seeing, rapid severe headaches accompanied by vomiting or dizziness, and trouble walking.
Such symptoms typically have a sudden onset, Tadwalker said. He said remembering the acronym BE FAST— or Balance, Eyes, Facial dropping, Arm numbness, Slurred speech, and Time being of the essence— can help save lives.
Chin said there are many questions that remain and there is still “lots to follow up on,” but that she “should be just fine.”
“Most importantly* I’ve learned that it’s not always obvious when someone has a stroke, and action is critical... be fast and call 911,” she wrote on Facebook.
