Beauty Parlor Stroke

A grieving widower in the UK is warning women to beware of hair salon stroke, caused by their heads being bent back while being washed. Malcolm Crabb is convinced his wife died of stroke because her head was bent back at the beauty salon while they were washing her hair. His wife Pamela was 51.

He said "I think there should be warnings in hairdressers about it."

Mrs. Crabb had a stroke in September 2000. The stroke hit soon after her appointment. Her speech became slurred and her hands claw-like. She was taken to hospital where tests revealed she had had a stroke. Mrs. Crabb died last week after having a second stroke.

According to the Stroke Association (UK), no real research has been carried out to show a link between beauty salons (hair washing) and strokes. However, the association says there are many cases reported in medical journals. They would like to see research done into this.

According to experts, when you push a person's head back into a sink his/her neck over-extends. According to neurologists Dr. David Bateman, Cumberland, UK, the neck can be stretched so that it kinks for a long time - as in hair-washing at a salon - the arteries get stretched and can tear if you are unlucky. As the bleeding between layers of tissue continues you can get clots building up, this eventually leads to a stroke.

Mr. Crabb said, when talking about his wife's first stoke "When she got up she wasn't speaking like she normally would. She felt awful and I didn't know what the matter was. Her speech then became slurred and her hands became like claws."

When he took her to hospital he said they asked whether she had had her hair done.

Mr. Crabb said "After that it all fell into place and we connected the stroke with the way she had her hair washed."

After her first stroke she became increasingly intolerant to cold weather. The couple eventually moved permanently to southern Spain.

An article 8 years ago in the Lancet writes about a woman who had her hair washed for five minutes at a salon and developed a stroke as a result of it. The doctors said that salons should place a cushion so as not to over-extend the neck.