Stroke Across America Community Event

The UMass Amherst Stroke Support Group will host its annual event to raise community awareness for stroke and aphasia on Wednesday, August 24, 2022 from 4:30-6:00 p.m. at the Northampton Center for the Arts.

This year, the group welcomes the Stroke Across America "Journey for Recovery" team, a group of cyclists who have been pedaling their way across America, spreading awareness about stroke, aphasia, and traumatic brain injury, and the long road to physical and emotional recovery and rediscovery of one’s identity. The Northampton community event marks the penultimate stop in the team’s 4,300-mile journey that began on May 19 in Astoria, OR, and will end in Boston, MA on August 27. The ride is led by Stroke Onward co-founders Debra Meyerson and Steve Zuckerman, stroke survivor and carepartner respectively, who have been sharing their personal stroke and brain injury stories and their experience living with aphasia, a condition that can result from stroke.

A poorly understood condition, aphasia is an impairment of language affecting the production and/or comprehension of spoken and written language, usually as a result of a left hemisphere stroke. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, stroke affects nearly 800,000 Americans each year, resulting in 137,000 deaths and leaving the majority of survivors with serious and chronic disability. Roughly 2.5 million people currently live in the U.S. with chronic, persistent post-stroke language impairments and resulting psychosocial consequences that can significantly restrict their ability to participate in routine activities associated with a meaningful life.

Join them to celebrate, connect, and learn. Email Jacquie Kurland at jacquie@umass.edu for more information.

RSVP here