She wasn't. At home on the afternoon of Saturday, Sept. 29, Stone began to feel "severe head pains," says her rep Cindi Berger; Stone's husband, San Francisco Chronicle executive editor Phil Bronstein, 51, rushed her to the emergency room at California Pacific Medical Center. Later she was transferred to more specialized neurological facilities at the Moffitt/Long Hospital at the University of California, San Francisco, where she underwent an angiogram, in which dye pumped through the veins helps produce a computerized map of the brain. Initially, says Berger, doctors thought it was "a tiny aneurysm that required no treatment." But a second angiogram showed bleeding consistent with what doctors call a subarachnoid hemorrhage. Such hemorrhages are usually caused by an aneurysm, a dilated and weakened portion of a blood vessel that is prone to rupture. They can also indicate other serious problems. "You can't take something like this lightly," says Dr. George Teitelbaum, a professor of neurosurgery at the University of Southern California-Keck School, who is not treating Stone. "Her health hangs in the balance in the next two weeks."
Berger—who describes Stone as "a very lucky woman"—says doctors have not found any brain damage, but she declined to speculate about the actress's prognosis. Stone, who works out regularly, eats sensibly and does not smoke, refers to the unresolved circumstances that might have triggered her blinding headache as "the mysteries." Doctors are keeping a close watch for complications that, if they occur, most often appear within 14 days: seizure, stroke and the loss of mobility, vision, speech, taste and memory. "It all depends on the extent of the injury," says Teitelbaum, "and where it occurred in the brain."
There is some good news: If attended to promptly, most complications are treatable through physical therapy, drugs and surgery. Even better, if Stone—who will remain at Moffitt/Long for a few days of further observation and testing—gets through the next week or so without complications, her chances for a full recovery improve dramatically. Which means that, while Stone won't be running in any long races in the immediate future, with luck she could return to her regular routine: making movies, participating in charity benefits and chasing after her 17-month old son, Roan.
Bronstein, who had his own scares with a heart angioplasty in 1999 and when a Komodo dragon bit his left foot last June, knows there is no other choice than to hope for the best. Still, sitting outside Moffitt/Long's intensive care unit last week, his tired, somber-looking face couldn't hide inevitable fear. Says Stone's L.A. friend: "I just hope she is okay."
Karen S. Schneider
Melissa Schorr in San Francisco and Frank Swertlow, Vicki Sheff-Cahan and Johnny Dodd in Los Angeles
- Contributors:
- Melissa Schorr,
- Frank Swertlow,
- Vicki Sheff-Cahan,
- Johnny Dodd.
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
