Middle Cerebral Artery Plaque Hyperintensity on T2-Weighted Vessel Wall Imaging Is Associated with Ischemic Stroke

Vessel wall imaging can identify intracranial atherosclerotic plaque and give clues about its components. We aimed to investigate whether the plaque hyperintensity in the middle cerebral artery on T2-weighted vessel wall imaging is associated with ischemic stroke.

We retrospectively reviewed our institutional vessel wall MR imaging data base. Patients with an acute ischemic stroke within 7-day onset in the MCA territory were enrolled. Patients with stroke and stenotic MCA plaque (stenosis degree, ≥50%) were included for analysis. Ipsilateral MCA plaque was defined as symptomatic, and contralateral plaque, as asymptomatic. Plaque was manually delineated on T2-weighted vessel wall imaging. The plaque signal was normalized to the ipsilateral muscle signal. The thresholds and volume of normalized plaque signal were investigated using logistic regression and receiver operating characteristic analysis to determine the association between normalized plaque signal and stroke.

One hundred eight stenotic MCAs were analyzed (from 88 patients, 66 men; mean age, 58 ± 15 years), including 72 symptomatic and 36 asymptomatic MCA plaques. Symptomatic MCA plaque showed larger plaque hyperintensity volume compared with asymptomatic MCA plaque. The logistic regression model incorporating stenosis degree, remodeling ratio, and normalized plaque signal 1.3-1.4 (OR, 6.25; 95% CI, 1.90-20.57) had a higher area under curve in differentiating symptomatic/asymptomatic MCA plaque, compared with a model with only stenosis degree and remodeling ratio (area under curve, 0.884 versus 0.806; P =.008).

The MCA plaque hyperintensity on T2-weighted vessel wall imaging is independently associated with ischemic stroke and adds value to symptomatic MCA plaque classification. Measuring the normalized signal intensity may serve as a practical and integrative approach to the analysis of intracranial atherosclerotic plaque.