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Research paper
Neurosurgery
Long term outcome after subarachnoid haemorrhage of unknown aetiology
  1. Liisa M Pyysalo1,
  2. Tero T Niskakangas1,
  3. Leo H Keski-Nisula2,
  4. Veikko J Kähärä2,
  5. Juha E Öhman1
  1. 1Tampere University Hospital, Department of Neurosurgery, Tampere, Finland
  2. 2Medical Imaging Centre, Tampere, Finland
  1. Correspondence to Dr L M Pyysalo, Tampere University Hospital, Department of Neurosurgery, P O Box 2000, Tampere FIN-33521, Finland; liisa.pyysalo{at}uta.fi

Abstract

Background and purpose The aim of this study was to assess the long term outcome after non-aneurysmal subarachnoid haemorrhage (SAH).

Methods 1154 patients with SAH were treated in our hospital between 1989 and 1999. From this patient population, 97 patients had a non-aneurysmal SAH. All hospital records and death certificates were studied and 33 patients were examined by MRI and MR angiography more than 9 years (mean 12 years) after the initial bleeding.

Results The cohort consisted of 97 patients. Mean follow-up time was 9 years (range 0–19). During the follow-up period, 13 patients (13%) died. Four (4%) died from the initial bleeding less than 5 weeks after the initial haemorrhage. There was no delayed mortality due to SAH or subsequent bleedings. MR angiography revealed no new findings in 33 surviving patients.

Conclusions Excess mortality during the first year after SAH was higher than 4%, and remained thereafter comparable with the general population. There were no rebleedings and MR imaging did not reveal any vascular pathology that could explain the earlier SAH.

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial License, which permits use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, the use is non commercial and is otherwise in compliance with the license. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/ and http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/legalcode.

https://doi.org/10.1136/jnnp.2010.239335

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    Footnotes

    • Funding The study was financially supported by EVO-funding of Pirkanmaa Health District and Maire Taponen Foundation.

    • Competing interests None.

    • Ethics approval The study was conducted with the approval of the Tampere University Hospital Ethics Committee.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.