Our guest speaker this month, Marie Rusnak, nurse practitioner at the Niagara District Stroke Centre put strokes in context by explaining that there are about 50,000 strokes in Canada each year with an annual price tag of 3.6 billion dollars. There are approximately 300,000 Canadians living with stroke.

A stroke was described as an interruption of blood and oxygen to a part of the brain. Two types were reviewed; the first, Ischemic, occurs in 80% of the cases and is a clot which blocks blood to the brain and the second, Hemorrhagic, occurs when a blood vessel breaks and results in bleeding in the brain.

The risk factors and warning signs were reviewed as well as the best practices. The history of the Stroke Program leading to the current status of the program in the Niagara Region was covered and revealed an impressive and complete pro-gram. All of the contact information for the pro-gram was provided in a Power Point handout of the entire presentation.

Our guest speaker for the February 10th meeting will be Ellen Savoia, Senior Planner with the City of St. Catharines. The title of her talk will be: ‘City Rules: An introduction to St. Catharines’ Offi-cial Plan and Zoning By-laws’.