NOT A STROKE: OFFICIALS SEE NO CONNECTION BETWEEN TWO STUDENTS WITH EERILY SIMILAR SYMPTOMS

Sarah Martin's brother leaned over his sister's hospital bed and told her to wake up. Grandma and Grandpa were coming to visit.

Sarah's eyelids fluttered then opened Friday morning. She was awake two days after suffering what doctors describe as poor blood flow to the brain.

The 17-year-old senior at Jackson High School, the daughter of Jack and Mary Ann Martin, remains at Cardinal Glennon Hospital in St. Louis as doctors try to determine what caused her to lose consciousness.

Sarah Martin is the second Jackson teen-ager within a week to suffer a neurological attack, an occurrence a county health official calls "a tragic, unusual coincidence."

The first student stricken was 14-year-old Lindsey Reedy, a freshman at R.O. Hawkins Junior High School. She died Monday at Cardinal Glennon Hospital.

An autopsy showed that a deformed blood vessel in her brain burst. The event was "something like a stroke," Cape Girardeau County Coroner John Carpenter said.

Vicky McDowell, the communicable disease coordinator for the Cape Girardeau County Health Department, said no evidence exists to indicate a communicable disease was involved. Likewise, there is no evidence of a correlation between the cases, she said.

McDowell, who is also a member of the Jackson Board of Education, said, "It's a tragic, unusual coincidence."

This week the health department has fielded many calls from parents concerned that a form of meningitis might be to blame. McDowell said that isn't the case.

"Everyone has just been panicked," she said. "Meningitis was never involved in either one of the girls."

People have been trying to draw a connection between the two illnesses, but McDowell said none exists.

"The only connection is that they were female and students at Jackson," she said. "It was not even the same kind of neurological problem."

But she understands parents' concern.

"The county health department is here to serve the public," McDowell said. "If there was ever anything the public needed to know, we would be the first to say."

Sarah Martin's uncle, Tom Martin, said Sarah's prognosis is good. On Friday she was awake several times, talking and responding to questions. Apparently she has no loss of movement.

"She is making progress," Tom Martin said. "It is going to be slow."

Doctors aren't sure what caused the blood flow to be interrupted. "There wasn't any bleeding in the brain although there was some blood clotting. It's just so rare for someone 17 years old," he said.

Sarah, a cross country runner, ran in a meet Tuesday and helped decorate the halls for the school's upcoming Homecoming celebration.

Wednesday morning her parents were unable to wake her for school and took her to a Cape Girardeau hospital. She was transferred to the St. Louis hospital where she remained unconscious Wednesday.

On Thursday, she responded somewhat to doctors, but didn't awake until Friday morning when her brother talked with her.

Jackson school officials, parents and students have expressed concern.

"Our first concern is for the girls and their families," said Superintendent Howard Jones. "We also are concerned for the rest of the students."

A teacher at the high school said the students are both worried about their classmate and a bit spooked.

"There's a sense all of us have when we're young that we're invincible," Jones said. "It shakes your confidence. It caused people to ask a lot of questions."

About 200 students, of their own initiative, gathered outside the high school at the close of classes Wednesday to pray for Sarah's recovery.

School counselors have been talking with students and the Jackson Ministerial Alliance has offered its help.

"Everyone is in prayer for the family of little girl who passed away and for the little girl who is in the hospital," McDowell said.