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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Neurol.
Sec. Stroke
Volume 15 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fneur.2024.1425440
This article is part of the Research Topic Signaling Pathways and Therapeutic Targets in Stroke View all 6 articles

A Severity Comparison of Leukoaraiosis in Ischemic and Hemorrhagic stroke: a Retrospective study

Provisionally accepted
Nedim Leto Nedim Leto *Bendik Søfteland Bendik Søfteland Halvor Naess Halvor Naess
  • Department of Clinical Medicine 1, Faculty of Medicine, University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Introduction: Leukoaraiosis (LA) is a common neuroradiological finding in patients suffering from stroke. Cerebral small vessel disease (SVD) is one of the leading etiologies behind both ischemic and hemorrhagic stroke (ICH), and for development of LA. Significant evidence that LA predicts risk of functional dependency and mortality, exists. However, studies examining the difference in LA severity between ischemic and hemorrhagic stroke is lacking. We therefore aimed to compare severity and abundance of LA in the two stroke subgroups.Methods: All patients admitted to the Department of Neurology, Haukeland University Hospital with an ischemic stroke and intracerebral hemorrhagic stroke (ICH) diagnose in the period 2006-2020 were included. We collected patient data regarding risk factors, clinical, radiological findings and outcomes from our local stroke registry. The presence and severity of LA were assessed using the Fazekas score based on CT imaging. We evaluated outcome using the modified Rankin Score (mRS) 7 days post stroke.Results: A total of 5084 patients were included in our analyses, 4437 (87 %) with ischemic stroke and 647 (13%) with ICH. LA was present in 2476 (45%) patients. In our ordinal logistic regression model, adjusting for age, sex, known hypertension, known diabetes mellitus and smoking, LA was more severe and more abundant in ICH compared to ischemic stroke patients (Fazekas score 1; OR Følsomhet Intern (gul)1.54, Fazekas score 2; OR 1.88 and Fazekas score 3; OR 2.13; p<0.001). Increasing severity of LA was associated with worse functional outcomes in both groups (ischemic stroke OR 1.49; p<0.001 and ICH OR 1.36; p<0.025.In this study, LA was more severe and abundant in patients with ICH.Unadjusted analyses showed that the association between ICH and LA increased by LA severity

    Keywords: Leukoaraiosis, Stroke pathophysiology, ischemic stroke, hemorrhagic stroke, stroke outcome improvements

    Received: 29 Apr 2024; Accepted: 07 Oct 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Leto, Søfteland and Naess. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Nedim Leto, Department of Clinical Medicine 1, Faculty of Medicine, University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.