Patients' perceptions on outcomes after mechanical thrombectomy in acute ischemic stroke

The modified Rankin Scale (mRS) is a clinician-reported scale that measures the degree of disability in patients who suffered a stroke. Patients' perception of a meaningful recovery from severe stroke, expected value of a stroke intervention, and the effect of disparities are largely unknown.

We conducted a survey of patients, their family members, and accompanying visitors to understand their personal preferences and expectations for acute strokes potentially eligible for acute endovascular intervention using a hypothetical scenario of a severe stroke in a standardized questionnaire.

Of 164 survey respondents, 65 (39.6%) were the patient involved, 93 (56.7%) were a family member, and six (3.7%) were accompanied visitors (friends, other). Minimally acceptable disability after a stroke intervention was considered as mRS 2 by 42 respondents (25.6%), as mRS 3 by 79 (48.2%), and as mRS 4 by 43 (26.2%) respondents. Race was associated with different views on this question (p < 0.001; Hispanic and Black patients being more likely to accept disability than Caucasian and Asian patients), while sex (p = 0.333) and age (p = 0.560) were not. Sixty-three respondents (38.4%) viewed minimally acceptable probability of improvement with an intervention as over 50%, 57 (34.8%) as 10-50%, and 44 (26.8%) as less than 10%.

A wide range of acceptable outcomes were reported regardless of gender or age. However, race was associated with different acceptable outcome. This is an important finding to demonstrate because of the persistent racial and ethnic disparities in the utilization of endovascular therapy for acute stroke in the United States.