You can save someone’s life if they’re having a stroke using a needle. If someone is having a stroke, sterilise a needle then use it to prick the tips of all 10 fingers of that person. After their fingers start to bleed, prick the soft parts of their ear. Then send them to a hospital.
You absolutely should not do this. If you suspect someone is having a stroke, call 999.
A video on Facebook with over two million views advises that you can “save a person from stroke using only a needle”. The video was originally posted in 2018, but has recently been shared again on the social media platform.
The video advises that if someone is having a stroke, you should sterilise a needle or a syringe, then use it to prick the tips of all 10 of the person’s fingers and ensure they bleed. It then says “if the victim’s mouth is distorted, massage his ears until they become red” and then prick the soft parts of each ear. It then says to send them to a hospital after “[waiting] until the victim comes to normal without any unusual symptoms”.
None of this is advisable and would likely put the person in more danger.
Ruth Goss, senior cardiac nurse at the British Heart Foundation told Full Fact: “This video is inaccurate, and the advice is dangerously misleading.
“If a person is having a stroke, the most important thing you can do is call 999 immediately. You should not delay in seeking urgent medical treatment or attempt to treat the patient yourself.”
She added that you can recognise a stroke by using the F.A.S.T. assessment, asking yourself whether the person is having:
She said: “It is called F.A.S.T. because if you are having a stroke, timing is vital. You could lose millions of nerve cells for every minute without treatment. The more time passes, the more your movement, speech and abilities could be affected. Acting F.A.S.T really does save lives.”
Not only is pin pricking totally unnecessary, it could make things much worse if it causes a delay in somebody experiencing a stroke getting proper treatment. A number of fact checkers around the world have also debunked this viral claim.
This article is part of our work fact checking potentially false pictures, videos and stories on Facebook. You can read more about this—and find out how to report Facebook content—here. For the purposes of that scheme, we’ve rated this claim as false because this will not save the life of someone having a stroke and you shouldn’t do it.
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