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Objective To investigate the distribution characteristics and risk factors of intracranial and extracranial aterial lesions in Chinese patients with ischemic stroke . Methods In this multi‐center study ,2 310 continuously inpatients with ischemic stroke diagnosed in 20 stroke screening and prevention project base hospitals from June 2015 to M ay 2016 were enrolled . Carotid ultrasonography and transcranial color‐coded sonography or transcranial Doppler were performed in all patients to confirm the presence of cerebral artery stenosis or occlusion . According to the distribution of lesions ,the subjects were divided into 2 groups :the simple intracranial artery stenosis group and the simple extracranial artery stenosis group . T he difference of risk factors between the two groups was compared . Results Of the 2 310 patients with ischemic stroke ,1 516 ( 65 .6% ) had simple intracranial artery stenosis and 794 ( 34 .4% ) had simple extracranial artery stenosis . T he incidence of anterior circulation artery stenosis was higher in the group of intracranial artery stenosis than that in the extracranial artery stenosis group ( 68 .1% vs 48 .7% , P ＜0 .001) . Posterior circulation artery stenosis and combined anterior with posterior circulation artery stenosis were more common in patients with extracranial artery stenosis group than those in intracranial artery stenosis group ( 36 .4% vs 22 .1% ,14 .9% vs 9 .8% ;all P ＜0 .001) . Univariate analysis of risk factors for stroke showed that patients with intracranial arterial stenosis had a higher prevelence of hypertension , diabetes ,obesity ,and family history of stroke ,and their systolic blood pressure ,diastolic blood pressure , body mass index ( BM I) ,fasting blood‐glucose ,glycosylated hemoglobin ,triacylglycerol ,total cholesterol , and low‐density lipoprotein cholesterol were significantly higher than those in the extracranial arterial stenosis group ( all P ＜ 0 .05 ) . T he proportion of elderly ( ≥ 65 years old ) ,male and smokers in the extracranial arterial stenosis group was significantly higher than that in the intracranial arterial stenosis group ( all P ＜0 .05) . Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that elderly ( ≥65 years old) ,male , and smoking history were independent risk factors for extracranial arterial stenosis ( OR＝ 2 .012 ,1 .637 , 1 .325 ,respectively ;all P ＜0 .05) . While hypertension ,diabetes ,less physical activity ,and high BM I levels were independent risk factors for simple intracranial arterial disease ( OR ＝ 1 .301 ,1 .252 ,1 .248 ,1 .030 , respectively ;all P ＜0 .05) . Conclusions There are significant differences in the distribution characteristics and risk factors of intracranial and extracranial aterial lesions in patients with ischemic stroke in China .
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Objective To investigate the clinical efficacy of carotid endarterectomy ( CEA) for the treatment of patients with dolichoarteriopathies of internal carotid artery combined with carotid artery severe stenosis. Methods From January 2013 to February 2018,the clinical data of 18 consecutive patients with dolichoarteriopathy of internal carotid artery combined with carotid artery severe stenosis admitted to the Department of Neurosurgery,the First Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University were analyzed retrospectively. All patients underwent color Doppler ultrasound,CT angiography (CTA),and DSA to assess the diseased vessels before operation,and blood perfusion of the cerebral hemisphere was evaluated by CT perfusion (CTP) imaging. Six patients of Metz grade Ⅱ and 4 of grade Ⅲ underwent valgus CEA +excision of the redundant internal carotid arteries;8 patients of Metz grade I were treated with standard CEA. Postoperative cervical vascular ultrasound,CTA,and CTP examinations were performed in order to understand the vascular patency of the surgery and correction of dolichoarteriopathies of internal carotid artery. The follow-up time was 6 to 72 months. The color Doppler flow imaging and CTA were used to assess the presence or absence of restenosis and MRI was used to evaluate the presence of new cerebral infarction. Results All 18 patients were successfully operated, and they had good vascular patency after operation. The Postoperative CTA showed that the distorted blood vessels had been straightened to varying degrees for ten patients who underwent valgus CEA treatment and the plaques were removed satisfactorily without stenosis for 8 patients treated with standard CEA. After operation,one patient developed sublingual nerve injury symptoms,which was improved after 3 months. One patient developed mild hyperperfusion syndrome,which was improved after 2 weeks. No patients died. Follow-up reexamination showed that all patients had no carotid artery restenosis and new stroke events. Conclusions CEA is a safe and effective treatment for patients with internal carotid artery dolichoarteriopathy combined with severe carotid stenosis. According to the characteristics of the lesions evaluated before surgery, surgical methods should be selected reasonably.
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Objective To investigate the influence of lengthening or tortuous basilar artery (BA) on the BA hemodynamic parameters measured by transcranial doppler (TCD).Methods 153 cases with CTA and TCD simultaneously evaluating the BA were included.According to CTA criterion,144 cases were with lengthening and/or tortuous BA and 9 cases were without lengthening and/or tortuous BA.The TCD cerebral hemodynamic parameters included peak systolic velocity (PSV),mean blood flow velocity (MFV),end diastolic velocity (EDV),pulsatility index (PI) and resistant index (RI).The relationship between the grading of lengthening/tortuous of BA and TCD parameters were analyzed.Results ①The TCD parameters (PSV,MFV,EDV,PI,RI) showed no significant statistical differences among the grades of lengthening BA.The correlation between the TCD paremeters (PSV,MFV,EDV,PI,RI) and the grades of lengthening BA showed no significant statistical differences.②The TCD parameters (PSV,MFV,PI,RI) showed significant statistical differences among the grades of tortuous BA.The TCD parameters (PSV,MFV,PI,RI) showed significant statistical differences between grade 0 and grade 3 of tortuous BA.The significant negative correlation between the TCD parameters (PSV,MFV,EDV,PI,RI) and the grades of tortuous BA was found.Conclusion The tortuosity of BA can lead to hemodynamic alterations,whereas the lengthening of BA does not affect cerebral hemodynamics significantly.
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Objective To evaluate the correlation between intracranial vertebral artery (VA) stenotic lesions at different locations and posterior circulation ischemia (PCI) symptoms.Methods The present study included 362 cases of patients with unilateral VA severe stenosis or occlusion confirmed by carotid Doppler ultrasonography,CT angiography and (or) digital subtraction angiography.According to the relationship between the location of stenotic lesion and posterior inferior cerebellar artery (PICA),all cases were divided into pre-PICA group (n=73) and post-PICA group (n=289).According to presentation of PCI symptoms,all cases were divided into symptomatic group (n=133) and asymptomatic group (n=229).On CDFI,hemodynamic parameters were analyzed and recorded,which included the peak systolic velocity (PSV),end diastolic velocity (EDV),resistance index (RI) and VA diameter (VAD) and spectrum shape.And the correlation between location of intracranial VA stenosis / occlusion and PCI symptoms was evaluated.The hemodynamic parameters of bilateral intervertebral segments were compared in patient with unilateral intracranial VA stenosis by paired t test.The ipsilateral intervertebral segment hemodynamic changes were compared among patents with different locations of unilateral intracranial VA stenosis by using independent sample t test.Using 2 × 2 crosstables and Pearson 22 test,the correlation between the location of VA stenosis and PCI symptoms was analyszed.Results Hemodynamic parameters of VA were associated with its stenotic location to PICA.The comparison of the ipsilateral and contralateral VA showed that PSV,EDV and RI,VAD had significant difference (43.97± 1.22 vs 55.82± 1.08,6.35±0.23 vs 19.41 ±0.48,0.850±0.004 vs 0.640± 0.005,2.75 ± 0.04 vs 4.00± 0.03),difference was statistically significan (t=-7.086,-23.754,-32.603,23.842,all P ＜ 0.001).The intervertebral segment PSV,EDV and RI of ipsilateral VA were significantly related to the stenotic location to PICA (t=-6.665,-17.459,22.143,P＜0.001),but not for VAD (P＞0.05).In pre-PICA group,the intervertebral segment spectrum of ipsilateral VA was unimodal-style,while in post-PICA group the spetrum was high-resistance-style.VA intracranial severe stenosis at different locations was not associated with the symptoms of PCI (r=0.023,P=0.782),while VA intracranial occlusion at different locations was associated with the symptoms of PCI significantly (r=0.792,P ＜ 0.05).Conclusions CDU is a non-invasive,real-time and dynamic assessment tool for VA intracranial lesions in different locations,which can provide reliable information for clinical treatment and prognosis prediction.
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Objective To investigate the feasibility and reliability of three-dimensional ultrasound in evaluating carotid artery vulnerable plaques with the method of prospective plaque scoring.Methods From February 2016 to March 2017,41 patients who performed carotid endarterectomy (CEA) in the department of neurosurgery at the First Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University were scheduled for conventional cervical vascular ultrasonography,three-dimensional ultrasonography (3D-US),CT angiography (CTA),CT perfusion imaging (CTP) and / or digital subtraction angiography (DSA) examinations before surgery.On pathology,the atherosclerotic plaque morphology and HE staining findings were evaluated after surgery.The results of preoperative 3D-US were compared with the corresponding postoperative pathologic findings.Each plaque was scored based on the plaque morphology,homogeneity,echo characteristics and degree of vascular stenosis in 3D-US.According to the pathological results,the plaques were divided into vulnerable plaque group (n=35) and stable plaque group (n=10).The plaque score difference between groups was compared using independent sample t test.Patients were classified into ischemic stroke group (n=27) and non-ischemic stroke group (n=14) according to whether ischemic stroke symptoms occurred during the last 6 months.Pearson x2 test was used to analyze the correlation between ischemic events and the vulnerable plaques.Results Plaque scores were significantly different between vulnerable plaque group and stable plaque group (5.3 ±0.2 vs 3.4±0.3,t=5.339,P ＜ 0.05).The accuracy of identifying vulnerable plaque by plaque score is high,while the area under the ROC curve is 0.907 with a cutoff 4.5 (the maximum Youden index is 0.671,the sensitivity is 77％,the specificity is 90％).There is a significant positive correlation between the occurrence of ischemic events and plaque vulnerability (r=0.858,P ＜ 0.05).Conclusion 3D-US can accurately and quantitatively assess vulnerability of carotid plaques,carotid artery vulnerable plaque was significantly associated with ischemic stroke,which can provide the basis for clinical individualized treatment.
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Objective To analysis the correlation between the vulnerability of carotid plaque and ischemic stroke and to explore the clinical significance of assessing vulnerable plaques accurately.Methods A total of 64 patients,who underwent carotid endarterectomy (CEA) in First Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University from October 2014 to February 2016,were classified into ischemic and non-ischemic stroke group according to whether ischemic stroke symptoms occurred during the last 6 months before surgery.To judge the stable and vulnerable plaques,the patients underwent carotid doppler ultrasonography (CDU) before surgery,and the carotid plaques were evaluated with HE staining after CEA.We also analyzed the risk factors of plaque formation and the relevance between the plaque characteristic and ischemic stroke with chi-square test.Kappa test were used to analyze the consistency of CDU and pathology.Results Of the 44 cases in ischemic stroke group,CDU identified 81.8％ (36/44) vulnerable plaques and 18.2％ (8/44) stable plaques,while pathology confirmed 86.4％ (38/44) vulnerable plaques and 13.6％ (6/44) stable plaques.Of the 20 cases in non-ischemic stroke group,CDU identified 35％ (7/20) vulnerable plaques and 65％ (13/20) stable plaques,while pathology confirmed 40％ (8/20) vulnerable plaques and 60％ (12/20) stable plaques.In both CDU and pathology,vulnerable plaques in ischemic stroke group were obviously higher than that in non-ischemia group (x2=13.67,P ＜ 0.001;x2=14.62,P ＜ 0.001).The results of CDU agreed well to that of pathology results (Kappa=0.669,P ＜ 0.01).Conclusions The vulnerability of plaques were closely related to the ischemic stroke.CDU is a reliable examination method to identify vulnerable plaques.The accurate assessment of vulnerability of plaques has a great significance in preventing ischemic stroke.
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Objective To investigate the differences of distribution characteristics and risk factors of large artery lesions in patients with ischemic cerebrovascular disease in different age groups in order to provide the basis for the prevention and treatment of stroke in different age groups.Methods From June 2015 to May 2016,a total of 10 711 consecutive inpatients with transient ischemic attack (TIA) and ischemic stroke from 20 centers nationwide were enrolled.Each 10 years was used as an age group from 40 years.All the patients were divided into 5 age groups.The differences of the different risk factors for cerebrovascular disease among the 5 groups were compared.All patients were separated by gender.The chi square test was used to compare the incidences of large artery stenosis of the intracranial and external and anterior and posterior circulation,and the number of vascular lesions in the same sex in different age groups.Results (1) The risk factors of elderly patients were mainly hypertension,diabetes mellitus,and atrial fibrillation (χ2=61.938,χ2=13.349,and χ2=55.940;all P<0.01).The smoking history,family history of cerebrovascular disease,and obesity were more frequent among the young and middle-aged people (χ2=131.505,χ2=7.298,and χ2=100.911,all P<0.01).(2) The linear trend chi square test results showed that the proportion of multivessel diseases in female and male extracranial arterial lesions increased gradually with the increase of age.(χ2=54.799,χ2=161.370,all P<0.01).The proportion of multivessel diseases in the intracranial artery in female decreased gradually (χ2=5.328,P=0.021),and that in male did not have obvious trend of change (χ2=0.289,P=0.591).(3) The linear trend chi square test results showed that the incidence of simple intracranial arterial stenosis in female and male intracranial arterial stenosis decreased gradually with the increase of age (χ2=20.090,χ2=42.351,all P<0.01),and the incidence of simple extracranial arterial stenosis increased gradually (χ2=40.311,χ2=90.698,all P<0.01).The incidence of both intracranial and extracranial artery stenoses increased gradually (χ2=12.077,χ2=45.887,all P<0.01).The incidence of simple posterior circulation vascular stenosis increased gradually in female (χ2=16.434,P<0.01),but that did not have obvious trend of change in male (χ2=1.701,P=0.192).The incidence of stenosis of both anterior and posterior arteries in female and male increased gradually (χ2=4.587,P=0.032;χ2=35.156,P<0.01).Conclusions The distribution of atherosclerotic lesions in ischemic cerebrovascular disease of the different age groups was different.No matter female or male patients,the majority of the young and middle-aged patients were intracranial artery lesions,and the elderly patients were mainly extracranial artery lesions.The majority of elderly women had posterior circulation artery lesions.Understanding the characteristics in patients with intracranial arterial lesion in different age groups will help to develop individualized stroke prevention and treatment strategies for the population of different age groups.
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Objective To investigate the effect of serum lipid level on carotid artery stenosis in patients with ischemic cerebrovascular disease.Methods Using a multi-center cross-sectional study,10 711 consecutive inpatients with transient ischemic attack (TIA) or ischemic stroke diagnosed clearly in 20 stroke screening and prevention project base hospitals from June 2015 to May 2016 were enrolled.According to the results of carotid ultrasonography,1 560 patients with extracranial carotid artery stenosis rate≥50% screened were enrolled in the study.They were divided into a severe stenosis group (70%-99%) and a mild-moderate stenosis group (5.80 mmol/L (7.3%[43/586]vs.0.4%[4/974]) and LDL-C>3.12 mmol/L (26.3%[154/586]vs.10.0%[97/974]) in patients of the severe stenosis group were higher than those in the mild-moderate stenosis group (26.3%[154/586]vs.10.0%[97/974]).Conclusion The high LDL-C and TC levels may increase the incidence of severe carotid artery stenosis or occlusion.
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Objective To analyze the correlation between smoking and occurrence of intracranial artery stenosis.Methods From June 2015 to May 2016,a total of 10 711 inpatients with transient ischemic attack (TIA) or ischemic stroke from 20 basel hospitals of nationwide were enrolled using a cross-sectional study,76 patients with unknown smoking and smoking cessation years were excluded.Finally,a total of 10 635 patients were enrolled.Transcranial color coded sonography and/or transcranial Doppler were used evaluate the intracranial artery stenosis lesions.The basic risk factors for cerebrovascular disease (age,sex,smoking and smoking years,whether smoking cessation and years,hypertension,diabetes,hyperlipidemia,atrial fibrillation,and family history of stroke) were recorded.According to the different smoking years,the smoking years were divided into five groups:non-smoking,smoking time ≤10-year,11 to 20-year,21 to 30-year,and >30-year groups for trend chi square test.According to the different smoking cessation years in the smokers,the smoking cessation years were divided into four groups:non-cessation,cessation time 1 to 10-year,11 to 20-year,and >20-year groups for trend chi square test.The effects of different smoking years and different smoking cessation years on the occurrence of intracranial arterial stenosis were analyzed.Results The incidence of intracranial artery stenosis in the smokers (40.4%[1 433/3 547]) was significantly higher than that in the non-smoking patients (29.4%[2 085/7 088]).There was significant difference (χ2=128.850,P<0.01),and the incidence of cerebral infarction in the smokers (91.6%[3 250/3 547]) was significantly higher than the non-smokers (85.0%[6 027/7 088]).There was significant difference (χ2=92.328,P<0.01).Smoking was an independent risk factor for intracranial artery stenosis (OR,1.603;95%CI 1.456-1.765;P<0.01).With the increase of smoking years,the detection rate of intracranial arterial stenosis increased gradually (trend χ2=115.437,P<0.01).Whether giving up smoking had no significant effect on the incidence of intracranial artery stenosis in patients with ≥20 years of smoking (trend χ2=1.043,P=0.307).Conclusions Smoking is an independent risk factor for affecting intracranial artery stenosis;the risk of disease increases with the number of smoking years.Long-term smokers (≥20 years) cannot reduce the effect on intracranial artery stenosis,even if they give up smoking.
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Objective To evaluate the efficacy and reliability of intraoperative microvascular Doppler uhrasonography (IMDU)in urgent clipping surgery of ruptured aneurysms,and assess the impact of this method on the surgical procedure itself.Methods For 62 patients who underwent urgent clipping surgery for the treatment of ruptured aneurysms,both blood flow velocities in the aneurismal sac and in the adjacent vessels and alterations of the Doppler spectrum were determined by IMDU before and after aneurysm clipping.The findings of IMDU were analysed and compared with those of visual inspection of the surgical site and postoperative angiography. Results A relevant stenosis of an adjacent vessel induced by efip position that had escaped detection by visual inspection was identified by IMDU in 12 out of 62 patients.In addition, IMDU demonstrated a primarily incomplete clipping aneurysm in 4 out of 62 patients.The clipping aneurysm was repositioned on the basis of the IMDU findings in 16 out of 62 patients.The findings from IMDU equated with those from angiography in 38 eases.Conclusion IMDU is a safe,instantaneous,effective and reliable technique for the urgent dipping surgery of raptured aneurysms.