Hypertensive brain diseases III lacunar syndromes

The term lacunar stroke has been used to indicate small cavities in the deep cerebral tissue as early as 1843 and was revisited at the turn of the century in 1901 by Marie. It was not until recently that certain clinically separate lacunar syndromes were identified and their etiopathogenesis precisely described by Fisher. The distinction of lacunar syndromes as an entity separate from other cerebrovascular strokes arises from: [1] their close relationship to arterial hypertension, [2] their restriction to a subcortical deep area in the territory of a single perforating [penetrating] artery, and [3] the typical lipohyalinosis found at autopsy