Loyola U Prof Discovers Sex and Orgasm-Related Strokes, Some Go Abstinent

You’ve heard of sex hazards like STDs and pregnancy, but now Loyola University neurology professor Jose Biller is bringing orgasm-related strokes to our attention. Evidently, a sex or orgasm-related stroke may occur when a person belonging to the group of 1 in 4 adults who has a minor heart defect called patent foramen ovale has a blood clot which breaks loose and is sucked into the heart during sex.

According to CBS:

Sex triggered a life-threatening stroke in a healthy 35-year-old Illinois woman, her doctors report.

 

Sex- and orgasm-triggered strokes in relatively young women and men are rare, but not unheard of. They require a combination of factors and events not unusual in themselves, but which are highly unlikely to occur at the same time.

The 35-year-old woman's symptoms were typical of this unusual kind of "cryptogenic" stroke, says Jose Biller, MD, professor and chair of the neurology department at Loyola University, Chicago.

 

"This young woman ... while having intercourse had numbness on the left side of her face, slurred speech, and weakness in her left arm," Biller tells WebMD. "When she was transferred to our care six hours after onset, she was completely unable to move her left arm, her face was paralyzed, her speech was garbled, and she was in a state of panic."

[…]

 

"If you develop sudden neurological symptoms during sex, it could be a stroke and you need to seek help urgently and go to the emergency room," Cucchiara says.

This may sound like an urban legend, but unfortunately it's not. Luckily sex-strokes are quite rare, so don’t worry your little hearts too much!