Leukoaraiosis and ventricular enlargement in patients with ischemic stroke

We studied the relationship between ventricular size and nonspecific periventricular lucency on computed tomograms (leukoaraiosis) in 192 patients with ischemic stroke. Leukoaraiosis did not occur in 21 patients less than 50 years of age; ventricular size could not be measured in an additional 29. Leukoaraiosis was graded from 0 to 4 on a semiquantitative scale; bicaudate, frontal horn, and posterior horn indices were used as measures of ventricular size. Patients with leukoaraiosis were older (difference between means 7 years, t = 5.3, df = 140, p less than 0.0001) and had larger bicaudate indices (difference between means 0.023, t = 3.54, df = 140, p = 0.0007) than patients without leukoaraiosis. Multiple regression analysis demonstrated that the effects of age and leukoaraiosis were independent. No effect of lesion type (cortical or lacunar infarct, or both) on bicaudate index could be demonstrated. Larger values for the bicaudate index were associated with a predominantly anterior location of leukoaraiosis. The frontal horn and occipital horn indices increased with age, but we could not find an effect of leukoaraiosis on these indices.