[Cerebrovascular disease in young adults. A study of its course in 167 patients]

Few studies have been made of the prognosis of ictus in the young adult. The objective of this paper is to study the short term evolution of 167 patients, aged between 15 and 45 years, with cerebral vascular disease.

Since 1986 a protocolized study has been made of all patients aged between 15 and 45 who were admitted to the Neurology Department of the Hospital General Universitario in Valencia for a cerebral vascular incident. The results obtained up to 1993 have been recorded in a data base. In this paper the demographic data and information as to intrahospital evolution have been used with the Canadian, modified Rankin and Barthel Scales in the various ictus groups.

28.7% of the patients were AIT and 71.3% were diagnosed as established ictus, of whom 38.8% were haemorrhagic and 61.2% were ischaemic. 29.8% of the HIP, 33.3% of the embolic infarcts and 18.2% of the atherothrombotic infarcts were severely disabled on discharge from hospital. Mortality was 4.2% when AIT were excluded.

Most studies are basically aetiopathological and much fewer include evaluation of prognosis. In our series, the patients had a satisfactory clinical course and low short-term mortality. As in the other series, the two groups with the worst prognosis were the HIP and the cardioembolic infarcts. Patients with HSA and HIV made outstandingly good progress.