Abstract
Cerebral aneurysms (CA) are incidentally detected by magnetic resonance angiography
(MRA) in acute stroke patients or asymptomatic volunteers. We investigated whether
incidental CA influences stroke subtypes and clinical outcome of patients with acute
brain infarction (BI) and hemorrhage (BH). Moreover, frequency and neuroradiological
profile of incidental CA were compared between acute stroke patients and asymptomatic
healthy controls. We included consecutive BI and BH patients who underwent magnetic
resonance imaging and MRA within 7 days from clinical onset. CA diagnosis was performed by 3-dimensional time-of-flight
MRA. Demographics, risk factors, stroke subtypes, and modified Rankin scale (mRS)
at 3 months after stroke were assessed. Incidental CA was detected in 18 (3.7%) of 481
stroke patients, 13 (3.5%) of 374 BI patients, 5 (4.7%) of 107 BH patients, and 146
(2.0%) of 7345 controls. Multivariate analysis showed no significant differences in
CA frequency between BI, BH, and control groups. Female sex was associated independently
with incidental CA in the stroke (P<0.01), BI (P<0.05), BH (P<0.05), and healthy control groups (P<0.01). No statistical differences in CA size and location between the 4 groups were
found. BI subtypes and BH sites were not correlated with incidental CA. CA rupture
or subarachnoid hemorrhage did not occur until 3 months after stroke. The 3-month mRS score did not differ between stroke patients
with and without CA. Prevalence of incidental CA did not differ statistically among
stroke, BI, BH patients and healthy asymptomatic subjects. The 3-month mRS score was
not affected by incidental CA. Female sex was only an independent factor for incidental
CA. Thus, we should pay more attention to incidental CA in female BI patients treated
with tissue plasminogen activator.
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: September 28, 2010
Accepted:
August 30,
2010
Received in revised form:
August 20,
2010
Received:
April 28,
2010
Identification
Copyright
© 2010 Elsevier B.V. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
