这位中风幸存者帮助改变了美国心脏协会
![Ima 彩旗, an educator and stroke survivor, helped form the AHA’s early Stroke Clubs. (Photo courtesy of 黛安•马丁; used with permission of Shutterfly Lifetouch, LLC)](/-/media/Images/Around-the-AHA/Centennial-images/Bunting_SC.jpg?sc_lang=en)
Ima 彩旗 walked into an 美国心脏协会 office looking for answers.
那是1974年,邦廷中风了. 当时她50多岁, 她向奥斯汀酒店的员工指出, 德州 office that survivors feel isolated and need more information on how to recover or prevent future strokes.
She asked the AHA to provide stroke education and to forge connections between survivors — and she wanted to help.
她确实帮了忙. 彩旗 was instrumental in forming the AHA's early Stroke Clubs where survivors met to support one another. She became coordinator for 德州分公司 Stroke Club and traveled around the state meeting with local chapters. 她的工作加速了美国心脏协会提高中风意识的势头, 教育及外展, 它为今天的美国中风协会奠定了基础.
坚定的决心
伊玛·贝尔·泰勒·邦廷于1920年出生在德克萨斯州的柯林斯维尔. She married at age 23 and received her bachelor's degree in education from Pan American University in Edinburg. 她在麦卡伦和拉伯克教五年级和六年级.
彩旗 was 44 in 1964 when she checked in to the hospital for a planned hysterectomy. She carefully scheduled the surgery for July so she would be well enough to return in September to her teaching job. 但是,邦廷再也没有回去工作.
手术期间她的血压下降了. 医务人员无法叫醒她. 她中风了.
我的脸耷拉下来, 我的头抬不起来,整个左半身瘫痪了,1974年7月,邦廷在《线上电子游戏飞禽走兽》的一篇文章中说.
When her hand fell off the bed, she had to wait for a nurse to move it back. 彩旗 started therapy within two weeks and learned to hold her head up again. 在一个练习中, 据《线上娱乐电子游戏网站》报道, a therapist sprinkled powder on a table and 彩旗 had to figure out how to pull her left arm through it in a figure eight.
“我一直都很独立,”邦廷在文章中说. “我只是想,如果我尽了我的职责,上帝也会尽他的职责."
彩旗 learned how to walk again but went home with a brace on her left ankle. 医生说她可能永远不会走很远的路. She built up her strength by exercising and swimming three times a week, proving them wrong.
When she couldn't consistently hold her left foot on a stationary bike pedal, 彩旗, 坚定而勤奋, 如果她穿高跟鞋就可以.
“那只是纯粹的决心,邦廷的女儿说, 黛安•马丁, 谁住在米德兰, 德州. “她跛得很厉害,但她可以到处走动. 她不会让生活阻止她. 她几乎过于独立了."
马丁回忆道, 后来的生活, and despite the left side of her mother's body always feeling partially numb, 她会开着丈夫死后买的房车出发. 亨特会离开,几天或几周都失去联系.
“她开着那辆房车到处旅行,”马丁说. “她会离开."
支持中风患者
The Stroke Clubs that 彩旗 helped organize were an adjunct of the AHA. 人们通过俱乐部交换小费, worked out problems and learned new research about their health struggles. 这些俱乐部还试图教育家庭成员.
马丁说:“我记得妈妈打电话说她有工作了.马丁当时已经结婚,20多岁. “她将成为一名中风协调员. 它变成了她喜欢的东西. 这对她来说意义重大. 她总是喜欢帮助别人."
Part of 彩旗's work was supporting stroke patients whose spouses left them after they had a stroke. One was a young mother whose husband left her after she had a stroke while giving birth. The woman, 彩旗 said, ended up making a full recovery after joining the club.
彩旗's trips to clubs around 德州 included one to Forth Worth in 1974 for the first stroke club conference in conjunction with the annual meeting of the AHA, 德州分公司. 邦廷是三位发言人之一.
埃尔帕索在1973年成立了一个中风俱乐部. Its 25 members met monthly and had socials and covered-dish suppers in summer. 俱乐部主席佛罗伦斯·沃希斯在1971年严重中风. Getting back into the mainstream was hard, she said in a February 1979 El Paso Times article. The club helps people to "try to encourage them every time they give up."
彩旗 made her trips in between a busy schedule of organizing high school reunions, 策划教会团体活动, 支持女童子军, 旅行和参加宣教旅行, 马丁说.
因为邦廷帮助成立了中风俱乐部, the AHA revised its mission statement in 1985 to include stroke and added stroke to its slogan in 1993.
彭廷于2013年去世,享年93岁. But some 50 years after her visit to the AHA office, her legacy lives on: Since the founding of the 美国中风协会 1998年,死于中风的美国人减少了.
“她会很高兴的,”马丁说.