When somebody experiences a stroke, every minute counts and being aware of the signs and symptoms is a critical factor to help achieve the best health outcomes for stroke patients.
HMRI supporter Alice Ginns had one of HMRI’s stroke awareness magnets on her fridge and she shares her story about how that constant reminder helped save her husband’s life when he experienced a stroke.

When somebody experiences a stroke, every minute counts and being aware of the signs and symptoms is a critical factor to help achieve the best health outcomes for stroke patients.

HMRI supporter Alice Ginns had one of HMRI’s stroke awareness magnets on her fridge and she shares her story about how that constant reminder helped save her husband’s life when he experienced a stroke.

On the 16^th of January 2024 my husband Graham was sitting at the table with me having coffee, he’d just finished mowing the lawn actually.

The next thing his left arm just dropped, and he said to me “ Alice, I think my arm has gone to sleep.” So, I gave his arm a bit of a massage but it was lifeless so it didn’t help.

Then this voice said to me “go to the fridge”, I wasn’t sure why but I did – the reason why stood out immediately.

The Stroke FAST magnet was on the fridge. I’d actually put it there a long time ago and thought “I’ll never need it” and forgot about it.

I went back to Graham and said “I think you are having a stroke”. I wasn’t sure if my patient needed to have all three symptoms before I called 000 but I called anyway and thought they would tell me.

The Ambulance arrived about 10 minutes later, it all happened so fast. The Ambo’s put us at ease and checked Graham over and confirmed it was a stroke and took him to hospital. Thankfully by the time he got there he had got all of his arm movements back.

And it’s funny. Just four days later, not thinking I couldn’t open the jam jar.  I passed it to Graham and he opened it with the same arm!

The stroke FAST magnet helped save my husband – he is doing well and has no permanent damage so we are blessed.

I called HMRI and asked if they could send me some extra magnets to share with my community group and friends as they all asked where they could get one. I hope you never need the magnet like we did, if you don’t already have one, contact HMRI and they’ll mail one to you.