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According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) a stroke occurs when something blocks blood supply to part of the brain or when a blood vessel in the brain bursts. The result can be long term brain damage, disability, and even death. The CDC also states that stroke is the fifth leading cause of death and long-term disability in the United States and that African Americans are 50 percent more likely to suffer a stroke compared to their white adult counterparts.

Shanta Quilette Carter-Williams is living proof of that statistic, having survived a heart attack in 2018 and a stroke in 2019. The Dallas, Texas resident recently participated in a virtual panel hosted by the CDC which highlighted the disparity in occurrence and health treat ment of stroke between African American and white adults. Carter-Williams is also founder of the Pink Peppermint Project, a non-profit organization that supports women diagnosed with breast cancer and their families and caregivers. She is uniquely situated to offer her insights on the imbalance in health care that African Americans are often on the receiving end of and recently shared her story with the Telegram.

As a working mother, Carter-Williams maintained a busy lifestyle, juggling home and a stressful job with the Internal Revenue Service while maintaining a focus on fitness and exercise. It was in 2012 that Carter-Williams first felt fluttering in her chest while running on the treadmill. She saw her doctor but received no referrals to a specialist, no orders for further testing, no medication, and few answers. The only diagnosis she received was for exercise-induced arrhythmia.

The symptoms didn't stop. As the years went by, Carter-Williams developed headaches, dizzy spells, chest discomfort, and fatigue. Although she was seen by a doctor numerous times, there still was no directive ordering further medical tests or a referral with a cardiologist. "Going back and forth to the emergency room with chest pains, going back to the doctor and complaining consistently of just not feeling well really did nothing," she recalls. "My doctor was very haughty, what he says, goes type of thing and I'm the patient, he's the doctor and he knows more than me. That's what I actually thought and I was unable to articulate myself and I knew something was wrong but I kept going."

Beginning in 2017, the chest pains became more apparent she recalls. This time the pain extended to her back and stomach and included nausea and increased fatigue. In 2018, Carter-Williams ended up in the hospital emergency room yet again. ER staff performed an electrocardiogram (EKG) and concluded she was suffering an anxiety attack. She was sent to the waiting room and told she would see a doctor shortly. Then the chest pains began again, this time with chest pressure around her trunk, and she was promptly transported to an ER bay, hooked up to a heart monitor, and given nitroglycerin. The doctor then told her she was having a heart attack. When asked by the doctor and nurses about a family history of heart issues, Carter-Williams said there was no family history of any heart problems that she knew of. However, when her mother arrived at the ER, it was revealed her mother and an uncle both had had heart attacks. The new revelation prompted doctors to keep her in the hospital for several more days, yet no preventative medication was prescribed and no further testing was ordered. The only direction doctors gave her was to reduce stress, exercise, and lose weight.

By 2019, Carter-Williams was still struggling with her health issues, and while at work one day, she felt a pain in her head, her vision went blurry, she became dizzy and her left side became numb. She collapsed and ended up in the ER where the initial diagnosis was a seizure. The following day, a neurologist determined she had had a stroke. She ended up needing a walker for a year and going to physical and speech therapy for two years. She later learned her stroke was a direct result of high cholesterol levels she was unaware she had, and that high cholesterol levels were part of her family medical history.

Looking back over her experience, Carter-Williams says she believe the medical community was indifferent to her needs and to what she was describing was happening in her body. She also believes that if her family had openly discussed medical issues common among family members, she might have been able to use that knowledge and may have been taken more seriously when describing her health complaints to her doctors. "People don't realize how important knowing your family history is because there is a direct connection between you and your family and there are a lot of diseases that are genetically passed down," she says.

She also believes it is every patient's right to question what the doctor says and to seek answers when facing health problems, even if it means seeking out a second opinion. "You have to advocate for yourself, that's how you stay alive. As the black community, we are the ones that are dying at higher rates of heart disease and stroke," she says. "In my breast cancer agency, I had a friend who is deceased now. The doctor diagnosed her with lupus twice; she didn't have lupus, she had stage 4 metastatic breast cancer. She kept going back and back until she found a doctor who diagnosed her properly. Don't take no for an answer and don't be constrained by having to pay co-pays, you can pay a co-pay but you can't pay your way out of death. Spend the money to check and if you don't have the money, there are so many organizations that help with co-pays, and medical buses that come into the community to help you get tested. Those things save lives." The bottom line, says Carter-Williams is to be proactive when it comes to your health.