The Leader • Saturday, October 12, 2019 • Page 1B
Series of miracles
Preferred Health DIRECTORY
Immediate care, medication helped Woodland Heights woman survive stroke By Betsy Denson betsy@theleadernews.com Woodland Heights resident Brenda Erickson credits her survival to a series of miracles – and being at the right place at the right time to get the care she needed. Nineteen months ago, Erickson was at home working on a real estate deal after spending the night in the emergency room with her mother, when she found herself struggling to find the right words. She knew something was wrong and called her husband into the room, but she resisted calling 911. “I didn’t want an ambulance,” Erickson said. “And I didn’t want the neighbors to see me. I wanted to get my deal done. I was in denial.” Even though Erickson started to feel better, an ambulance came to transport her to Memorial Hermann Memorial City Medical Center, where she spent the night. The next day, after an uneventful evening, Erickson was getting dressed to go home when she felt dizzy. “My head was so cloudy and foggy,” Erickson said. Even when doctors determined she was having an ischemic stroke, with a block to blood flow in her brain, Erickson was in disbelief. “I was not in pain,” she said. “In fact, I thought they were wrong.” Erickson, who then lost movement in her hand and leg on her right side, soon was given tPA, a medication that dissolves blood clots that was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in 1997 to treat ischemic-type strokes. It is not effective for hemorrhagic strokes and has to be administered within a certain window of time after the stroke to be effective. A news release by Memorial Hermann said that when given promptly, one out of every three patients who receives tPA medication experiences major improvement in stroke symptoms, or sometimes, the symptoms resolve altogether. The medication helped Erickson, who spent one week in intensive
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“I was not in pain. In fact, I thought they were wrong.”
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- Brenda Erickson
Ophthalmology
Dora Cantú, M.D.
713.864.8652 1740 W. 27th St. Suite 180 Houston, TX 77008 www.opiavisioncenter.com
Obstetrics / Gynecology
Contributed photo Woodland Heights resident Brenda Erickson, with husband John, said she has regained most of her mobility after an ischemic stroke in 2017.
care and then entered the acute inpatient rehabilitation unit at TIRR Memorial Hermann Greater Heights. Dr. Richard Huang, the attending physician at TIRR Memorial Hermann Greater Heights and assistant professor of physical medicine and rehabilitation at McGovern Medical School at UTHealth, said it is very beneficial for stroke patients to attend an intensive, comprehensive inpatient rehabilitation program soon after a stroke. “People tend to make most of their improvements in six months,” Huang said, adding that continued
improvements can happen after that time. He said spasticity, which is a condition in which certain muscles are continuously contracted, might affect rehabilitation and once that is treated, improvements will follow. “We focus on re-educating the brain to restore normal body movements by strengthening weak muscles and fixing abnormal body movement patterns that may occur after a stroke, all in an effort to improve functional mobility and selfcare skills such as eating, grooming, dressing, toileting and showering,” Huang said in the release.
Erickson said she gained a new appreciation for the disabled. “I just wanted to turn over a quarter, or roll out a piece of clay,” Erickson said. “I wanted to wash my face and blow my nose. In 20 years, I hadn’t been to the hospital. Your life is upended.” When she left inpatient rehab, Erickson was in a walker and could barely get down her driveway. She said she now has regained most of the mobility she lost and, because she is left-handed, could eat and brush her hair easily as well as
By Betsy Denson betsy@theleadernews.com
DR. STEPHANIE FULTON Stephanie Fulton, M.D. 1740 W. 27 St. Suite 301 Houston, TX 77008 713-880-2727 www.fultonobgyn.com
Major Hospitals
Memorial Hermann Greater Heights 1635 North Loop West Houston, Texas 77008 Tel: 713-867-2000 memorialhermann.org Physician Referral 713.222.CARE
See Stroke P. 3B
Company provides virtual care Ways2Well, founded in 2018 by Heights resident Brigham Buhler, is a virtual preventative health care provider that uses blood lab analysis to provide data on patients’ health states. Buhler said the company’s origin was inspired by his personal journey. Buhler spent 15 years in the medical industry, first with American pharmaceutical company Eli Lily and then for Stryker, a Fortune 500 medical technologies firm. “I was working long hours and trying to be everything to everyone,” Buhler said. In his late 20s, he saw a nutritionist and did CrossFit to try to lose weight and ward off the diabetes that runs in his family. But Buhler, who was pre-diabetic, he said he wasn’t seeing results. After a months-long wait to see a specialist and the expense of having a wide array of tests run, Buhler said it was discovered that he was low on a wide array of hormones. He described his subsequent hormone therapy treatments as life-changing, because they helped his body react better to exercise and diet changes. Buhler wished he could have improved his health much earlier. “I wondered, ‘What if we could stop the progression (toward disease)?’” he said. Along the way, Buhler linked up with Aaron Schneider, who had spent more than 15 years as a pharmacy technician, pharmacist, pharmacy manager, and director of operations. Together they cofounded ReviveRx, a licensed compounding pharmacy that is the sister company of Ways2Well. They both are under the same roof in Garden Oaks at 3831 Golf Dr. Completing the team is Tay Bagley, Ways2Well’s chief
Chiropractic Care
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St. Joseph Medical Center
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in The Heights 1917 Ashland Street Houston, Texas 77008 Tel: 713-757-1000 Physician Referral 713-757-7575
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Contributed photo From left to right are Ways2Well chief operating officer Tay Bagley, ReviveRX head pharmacist Aaron Schneider and Ways2Well founder Brigham Buhler.
operating officer who runs daily operations and explores market expansion opportunities. Bagley spent the early part of his career in sales and management at Stryker and MediSmart. Schneider and Bagley are also residents of the Heights. What makes Ways2Well innovative, according to Buhler, is the time that patients spend with a health care provider as well as Ways2Well’s self-pay system, in which clients don’t go through insurance to get a blood panel. “A primary care physician has to do it all in eight minutes,” Buhler said. “They have to practice sick care.” Buhler contrasts that with the 75 minutes that a Ways2Well patient will spend in consultation with one of their health care providers – and they don’t have to wait months for an appointment or
pay for parking. He also said that if a comprehensive panel is done with a doctor and billed through insurance, the cost can be thousands of dollars, and there is no guarantee that insurance will pick up the total cost. That cost can also effect what kind of tests doctors order. With the self-pay system, not billed through insurance, lab tests range from $99-$299 for a full work-up. “Our goal is to be the Amazon of health care,” Buhler said. The way it works is that patients will have their first virtual consultation with Ways2Well and then the company schedules the patients’ lab work at a Quest Diagnostics of their choice. Once the tests are done, results are sent to Ways2Well – which it says is a HIPAA-compliant medical provider – and another virtual
appointment is done through a secure video call provider. The session is between the Ways2Well nurse practitioner Danese Rexroad with medical director Dr. Mark Mahaffey as a resource. “They walk you through the results,” Bagley said. The analysis of the comprehensive blood panels are used to detect genetic and early markers of disease and illness. “The focus is wellness care,” Bagley said, noting that if there any markers for serious illness or disease, patients are then referred to a specialist. With test results, ReviveRx can prescribe and compound custom-created prescriptiongrade vitamins and supplements for the patient. And it can happen in real time because they are next door. See Virtual Care P. 3B
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