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Patent foramen ovale, cerebrovascular risk, and complement

¹ The National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, Queen Square, London WC1N 3BG, UK

Correspondence to:
Correspondence to:
Dr A K Demetriades;
andreas.demetriades@doctors.org.uk

Keywords: patent foramen ovale; risk factors; cerebrovascular events; sport diving

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Nedeltchev et al¹ report that the presence of a patent foramen ovale (PFO) is a significant risk factor for recurrent cerebrovascular events, the risk being higher in patients with more than one previous embolic event. They highlight the absence of a current proven medical treatment or prevention regimen. Cardiac right to left shunting is present in a quarter of the population. It is thus worth drawing attention to a particular subgroup of patients with PFO that may be at an even more increased risk than the authors report—sport divers, most of whom fall within the age range of the above study.

Neurological sequelae constitute 80% of decompression sickness. Not only has neuroimaging shown an increased frequency of brain ischaemic lesions in divers, but also multiple such ischaemic lesions have been found specifically in sport divers with PFO.² While PFO patency of haemodynamic significance is a risk factor that necessitates habit . . . [Full text of this article]

K Nedeltchev², M Arnold², H Mattle², S Windecker³, A Wahl³

² Department of Neurology, Inselspital, University of Bern, 3010 Bern, Switzerland
³ Department of Cardiology

Correspondence to:
Correspondence to:
Prof Dr H P Mattle, Department of Neurology, Inselspital, CH-3010 Bern, Switzerland;
heinrich.mattle@insel.ch