RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 The impact of lesion location and lesion size on poststroke infection frequency
JF Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery & Psychiatry
JO J Neurol Neurosurg Psychiatry
FD BMJ Publishing Group Ltd
SP 198
OP 202
DO 10.1136/jnnp.2009.182394
VO 81
IS 2
A1 Jens Minnerup
A1 Heike Wersching
A1 Benjamin Brokinkel
A1 Rainer Dziewas
A1 Peter Ulrich Heuschmann
A1 Darius Günther Nabavi
A1 Erich Bernd Ringelstein
A1 Wolf-Rüdiger Schäbitz
A1 Martin Andreas Ritter
YR 2010
UL http://jnnp.bmj.com/content/81/2/198.abstract
AB Objectives Infections in patients with stroke are common and significantly affect outcome. Various predictors of poststroke infections were determined, such as degree of neurological impairment and implementation of therapeutic interventions. The authors investigated whether stroke location and stroke size are independent risk factors for poststroke infections.Methods 591 patients with acute stroke who were treated on our stroke unit were included in a prospective observational study. Predefined endpoints were pneumonia, urinary-tract infection (UTI) and other infections. The OR of infections was calculated for various stroke locations, stroke lateralisation and three categories of stroke size. Logistic regression models were used to adjust for factors significantly associated with poststroke infections in a single-factor analysis.Results In the single-factor analysis, the left anterior cerebral artery territory was associated with pneumonia. After adjustment for relevant covariates, this association was no longer statistically significant. Stroke lateralisation showed no association with infection frequency. The largest stroke size was positively associated with pneumonia (OR 3.5, p<0.001). The smallest lesion size was significantly less associated with the occurrence of UTI (OR 0.4, p<0.01).Conclusion In this study, lesion size is an independent risk factor for the development of poststroke infection. Particular brain regions associated with infections could not be determined.