Katie Jerdee

GREENVILLE, N.C. (2/5/10) — As a college sophomore, 20-year-old Katie Jerdee of Boston suffered a massive stroke, something she thought only happened to older adults.

Too often, people dismiss warning signs and wait too long for help, thinking a problem will go away on its own. Jerdee stressed how important it is to heed symptoms in her talk at the Wear Red for Women event at the East Carolina Heart Institute at ECU today.

She was running in November 2006 with her Northeastern University soccer team when she began to veer uncontrollably into oncoming traffic. She grabbed a street sign post to stop. “It felt like a giant magnet was pulling my right arm,” she said, adding she got a severe headache like never before. She slurred her speech when she talked. A teammate who was a nursing major suggested she go to the emergency room. Jerdee agreed thinking she was probably just dehydrated.