Democrat frontrunner Hillary Clinton’s disappearance from the debate stage last month left people speculating that the former First Lady took a long bathroom break, but now a law-enforcement source with inside connections is alleging that Clinton was missing from the stage due to health issues stemming from a previous brain injury.
These long-lasting symptoms stemming from a concussion and blood clot, according to a neurologist, suggest Clinton is suffering from post-concussion syndrome, which can severely impact her cognitive abilities.
All that said, however, Clinton’s campaign maintained to Breitbart News that she is in good health and can serve as President of the United States.
“Strong source just told me something I suspected. Hillary’s debate ‘bathroom break’ wasn’t that, but flare up of problems from brain injury,” wrote John Cardillo on Twitter.
Cardillo, who previously worked as an officer who provided VIP security details for the New York Police Department (NYPD), told Breitbart News that he knows of two additional sources who have commented about Clinton’s health problems, which have even impacted her ability to walk to her car after delivering a speech.
“I got this from both a [federal agent] … and I also got it from a New York [NYPD] guy who worked security at a Hillary event in New York City,” Cardillo told Breitbart News, adding:
These are two people that aren’t just personal friends. I worked with one and then post law-enforcement worked with another on some related things. So, these aren’t anonymous people. These are good friends. Both of them told me the same thing, that after her speeches, whether she did a talk or a policy speech, she had to sit behind – she would come off the podium backstage – and have to sit and rest before making it back to the car because she was so fatigued, dizzy and disoriented.
Cardillo said these two security officials don’t know each other and do not live in the same state, but “their stories were almost identical.”
One of the men told him that Clinton was “very pale, kind of disoriented. He said she looked like she was about to faint. She was very pale, almost sweaty.”
Cardillo said one of the incidents occurred while she was Secretary of State. The event worked by the NYPD official was roughly a year ago.
Veteran Republican strategist Roger Stone, who previously worked with GOP frontrunner Donald Trump, told Breitbart News that he has also heard about Clinton’s long-term health problems.
“A number of New York Democrats, very prominent, well-known, wealthy New York Democrats, told me last year that Hillary had very significant health issues and that they were surprised that she was running in view of her health problems and her lack of stamina,” Stone told Breitbart News. “So far, she’s run a very controlled campaign,”
“I don’t think she has the physical stamina to be president,” he stated. “I have no doubt that Marco Rubio won’t call her on it, but Trump certainly would.”
“We also know that in the emails, of course, Huma Abedin… says that she is easily confused,” Stone added, referencing Clinton’s close confidant Abedin comment in an email, “She’s often confused,” referring to Clinton.
Trump, Stone’s former boss, certainly hasn’t been shy in questioning whether Clinton has the “stamina” to be president.
“She goes out and she sees you guys for about 10 minutes, she sees you for a little while, it’s all rehearsed and staged,” Trump said in a recent interview on Fox News’ Media Buzz.
“They’ll pick a couple of people out of the audience that are like, you know, 100 percent. She’ll sit around a little plastic table, they’ll talk to the people for a while. It’s ridiculous,” Trump added. “And then she goes away for five or six days and you don’t see her. She goes to sleep.”
Neurologist Dr. Daniel Kassicieh, D.O., reviewed news reports of Clinton’s head injury in light of the recent information revealed from the security sources that are raising questions about her current health status.
Kassicieh, who has run his own Sarasota, Florida, practice for 20 years, is a board-certified neurologist and the medical director of the Florida Headache and Movement Disorder Center. He is a doctor of osteopathic medicine, which is similar to a medical doctor but can involve at a minimum of 100 more classroom hours of specific training. That additional training is focused on the osteopathic—or the musculoskeletal system—aspects of medicine. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Neurology (FAAN) and a Fellow of the American College of Neuro-psychiatrists (FACN). Kassicieh is a registered Republican in Sarasota, but his purely medical analysis is troubling for Clinton.
“They were trying to poo-poo this off as a minor concussion, but I would just say that reading it and trying to take all the politics out of it, and just read it purely from a medical standpoint,” Kassicieh explained:
Considering the point of what happened with Hillary over this time period… the timeline… and then what has happened here more recently… the break at the debate, I saw that and even the commentators that were sitting there made a comment that, ‘Gee, that seems awful long for a break.’ Just looking at it from a neurological standpoint, the risk factors for developing post-concussion syndrome, one of them is age, and she was 65 when this happened… just from a physiologic standpoint that’s an older individual. Being female is a risk factor for post-concussion syndrome as well.
“For someone who has treated many post-concussion syndrome patients and that’s what I really believe she’s suffering from based on reading these reports and reading what’s happened,” Kassicieh said. “I think she has latent post-concussion syndrome, and I can understand that as a politician they would want to be covering that up.” He stated:
I would say as a neurologist having seen many post-concussion syndrome patients that I would not want a president who I knew had post-concussion syndrome being president because their super high-level cognitive abilities are clearly impaired and even their routine multitasking high-stress abilities are affected because post-concussion syndrome patients in general don’t tolerate even moderate work, stress-related environments.
Kassicieh added that if suffering from post concussion syndrome, Clinton’s symptoms could appear “well beyond a year” after her concussion.
“A transverse sinus thrombosis [blood clot] is a rare condition of a clot forming in the venous sinus cavities surrounding the brain,” Kassicieh told Breitbart News, referencing an ABC News report from 2012 that detailed Clinton’s head injury and blood clot following a fall. He explained:
These venous sinuses drain blood out of the brain. The [injury] incidence is only about 3 per 1,000,000 adults. The transverse sinus is less commonly affected than the main sagittal venous sinus. The cause of transverse sinus clots is not well understood although trauma and dehydration have been described as risk factors. Mrs. Clinton suffered from both.
Dr. Nicholas C. Bambakidis also analyzed the facts for Breitbart News. He is the director of cerebrovascular and skull base surgery, and the program director of neurological surgery at University Hospitals Case Medical Center in Cleveland, Ohio, and a professor of neurosurgery and radiology at the CWRU School of Medicine in Cleveland,
“These types of clots are usually formed spontaneously without an obvious cause,” Bambakidis said in an email:
They can be associated with dehydration, a predisposition to blood clotting disorders, are more common in women and may be associated with oral contraceptive medication, severe head trauma, brain surgery, or infection. If untreated, they can progress and lead to bleeding in the brain or swelling, and a stroke or even death. The treatment is generally anticoagulation and treatment of any underlying cause.
Bambakidis said that if treated early and quickly, there are no longstanding issues with a person’s health.
“Typically, if caught early and treated adequately (as seems to have been done in this incident) there is a full recovery without any consequences (normal cognition, memory, etc),” he said.
Dr. Jane Orient, the executive director of the politically conservative Association of American Physicians and Surgeons also reviewed the 2012 ABC News report about Clinton’s concussion and blood clot. She said she thought the ABC report appeared medically accurate.
“Factors predisposing to clots include air travel, dehydration, hormones, immobilization as during surgery, blood abnormalities, cancer,” Orient said. “Concussions can cause long-term damage including cognitive problems, even when standard studies including CT or MRI look normal.”
“Not saying Mrs. Clinton has any of the above–just speaking generally and hypothetically,” she clarified.
One former member of Orient’s group is Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), an ophthalmologist. He was a member of AAPS for more than 20 years before his election to the U.S. Senate. He is now also running for president on the Republican side in 2016.
Neurologist Kassicieh agreed with Orient about the possibility of Clinton suffering from long-term cognitive symptoms.
“Concussions in older adults can be more serious, resulting in a condition known as post-concussion syndrome. This condition can be characterized by symptoms of persistent dizziness, complaints of memory difficulties, forgetfulness, loss of ability to focus on complex tasks or concepts and indecisiveness,” Kassicieh explained. He added, “Latent depression and overt anxiety are also common in this condition.”
Kassicieh noted that although a Clinton spokesperson told the press that Clinton “got over this quickly,” another ABC report quotes former President Bill Clinton saying that his wife’s injury “required six months of very serious work to get over.”
“Other reports in the same article show an interesting timeline for Hillary over the next several months, showing that she was not fully functional in her capacity as [Secretary of State],” Kassicieh added:
As a neurologist, I would interpret these and more recent events involving Hillary as possibly showing signs of post-concussion syndrome. This condition could have serious impact on the cognitive and intellectual functioning of an individual, particularly a high level job as [President of the United States].
Dr. Drew Pinsky, nationally syndicated radio talk show host heard on KABC radio “Dr. Drew Midday Live,” also spoke to Breitbart News about Clinton’s health and explained that experiencing symptoms for more than a year after a head injury is very serious.
“In my clinical experience, it’s very common for them to have six months and even up to a year of exercise intolerance, and sort of [needing] frequent rest, and can easily get overwhelmed,” he said of head injury patients. “But after a year, that’s something else.”
He said symptoms like Clinton’s, as an elderly person in her 60s, “are very serious.”
“Those are not trivial symptoms,” Pinsky stressed:
If my patient came in with that, the first thing I would do is put them on a treadmill. I would get a sleep study, make sure they don’t have sleep apnea. I would do all sorts of metabolic studies and make sure there wasn’t something metabolic. I would actually do some extensive cancer screenings. Why is this person suddenly having exercise intolerance?
Pinsky added that if Clinton is overworking herself, “I hope she has a medical team attending to her.”
Breitbart News sent a detailed set of questions regarding these questions raised by law enforcement and medical professionals to Clinton’s campaign.
The specific questions sent to Nick Merrill, a spokesman for Clinton, include:
1.) Does Secretary Clinton have difficulty with fatigue, dizziness and being disoriented? Does she have difficulty after speeches and during debates continuing for lengthy periods of time–or for instance walking back to her car after events?
2.) Is she suffering from latent post concussion syndrome?
3.) Is she being completely honest with the public about her health? Does she have a clean bill of health?
4.) Is she able to conduct high level cognitive abilities on the same level she has been able to throughout her life? Is she able to conduct routine multitasking high stress abilities on the same level she has been able to throughout her life?
5.) Does she have or did she have a transverse sinus thrombosis, or blood clot?
6.) Is she capable of serving as President of the United States with these conditions and symptoms?
7.) Has she done tests with a doctor on a treadmill? Has she gotten a doctor-supervised sleep study? Has she worked with a doctor on metabolic studies? Has she gotten cancer screenings?
8.) Does she have a medical team attending to her? What are the details of that?
In response, Merrill told Breitbart News that Clinton’s doctors have already answered the questions in Clinton’s health statement.
“These questions are all addressed in her health statement,” Merrill told Breitbart News, referring to a letter from Clinton’s doctor, Dr. Lisa Bardack—the chair of internal medicine at the Mount Kisco Medical Group in New York.
The letter, labeled a “healthcare statement” and dated on July 28, 2015—which was released along with Clinton’s tax filings—is two full pages long and includes a complete description from Dr. Bardack clearing Clinton as fit to serve as president.
“This letter summarizes the health history and current medical evaluation of Hillary Rodham Clinton,” Dr. Bardack wrote. “I am an internist and the Chairman of the Department of Medicine at the Mount Kisco Medical Group in Mount Kisco, New York. I have served as Mrs. Clinton’s personal physician since 2001, during which time I have been involved in all aspects of her healthcare.”
The letter states that Clinton is a “healthy 67-year-old female whose current medical conditions include hypothyroidism and seasonal pollen allergies.”
“Her past medical history is notable for a deep vein thrombosis in 1998 and in 2009, an elbow fracture in 2009 and a concussion in 2012,” Dr. Bardack continues.
“In December of 2012, Mrs. Clinton suffered a stomach virus after traveling, became dehydrated, fainted and sustained a concussion,” the doctor wrote:
During follow-up evaluations, Mrs. Clinton was found to have a transverse sinus venous thrombosis and began anti-coagulation therapy to dissolve the clot. As a result of the concussion, Mrs. Clinton also experienced double vision for a period of time and benefitted from wearing glasses with a Fresnel Prism. Her concussion symptoms, including the double vision, resolved within two months and she discontinued the use of the prism. She had follow-up testing in 2013, which revealed complete resolution of the effects of the concussion as well as total dissolution of the thrombosis. Mrs. Clinton also tested negative for all clotting disorders. As a precaution however, it was decided to continue her on daily anticoagulation.
The letter continues by detailing her current medication list, which includes Armour Thyroid—a hormone used to treat an under-active thyroid– plus various antihistamines, Vitamin B12 and the blood-thinner Coumadin.
“She was also advised in 1998 to take Lovenox, a short-acting blood thinner, when she took extended flights; this medication was discontinued when she began Coumadin,” Dr. Bardack continued:
Her Coumadin dose is monitored regularly and she has experienced no side effects from her medications. She takes no other medications on a regular basis and has no known drug allergies. She does not smoke and drinks alcohol occasionally. She does not use illicit drugs or tobacco products. She eats a diet rich in lean protein, vegetables and fruits. She exercises regularly, including yoga, swimming, walking and weight training.
Dr. Bardack noted that Clinton’s family history also complicates matters: her father “lived into his 80s and died after having a stroke” while her mother “lived into her 90s and passed away after having congestive heart failure.” One of her brothers—it’s not clear whether it’s Tony or Hugh Rodham, according to this letter—“had premature heart disease,” Dr. Bardack wrote.
“Due to her family history, she underwent a full cardiac evaluation, which was negative,” the doctor wrote. “She had a coronary calcium score of zero and a normal carotid ultrasound.”
She’s also had cancer screenings: “Her routine health maintenance is up to date, and has included a normal colonoscopy, gynecologic exam, mammogram, and breast ultrasound.”
She had a physical on March 21, 2015, which revealed, according to Dr. Bardack, that Clinton was in top-notch health.
“In summary, Mrs. Clinton is a healthy female with hypothyroidism and seasonal allergies, on long-term anticoagulation,” Dr. Bardack wrote. “She participates in a healthy lifestyle and has had a full medical evaluation, which reveals no evidence of additional medical issues or cardiovascular disease. Her cancer screening evaluations are all negative. She is in excellent physical condition and fit to serve as President of the United States.”
Clinton’s own campaign manager Robby Mook wouldn’t commit during a mid-June 2015 interview on CBS’s Face The Nation to release Clinton’s full health records.
“I will let Hillary decide that,” Mook replied when John Dickerson asked him if Clinton would release her full healthcare records. “But I can tell you she has been hitting the campaign trail hard.”
The letter from Clinton’s doctor—not her full healthcare records, but just a mere statement—came after that Mook interview.
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