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Xenon-enhanced CT assessment of cerebral blood flow in stroke-in-progress patients with unilateral internal carotid artery or middle cerebral artery stenosis

Neuroscience Bulletin volume 29, pages 693–700 (2013)Cite this article

Abstract

Carotid or cerebral artery stenosis resulting in low perfusion is a major cause of ischemic stroke. Understanding the unique hemodynamic features in each patient undergoing a stroke-in-progress (SIP) and the correlation between progression and cerebral blood flow (CBF) status would help in the diagnosis and treatment of individual patients. We used xenon-enhanced CT (Xe-CT) to examine cerebral perfusion in patients with or without SIP (30 patients/group), recruited from October 2009 to October 2010. Only SIP patients with unilateral stenosis in the internal or middle cerebral artery were recruited. The occurrence of watershed infarction was higher in the SIP group than in the non-SIP group (P <0.05). In the SIP group, larger hypoperfused areas were found around the lesions than in the non-SIP group. In the SIP group, the CBF values in the ipsilateral areas were significantly lower than those in corresponding regions on the contralateral side. CBF values in the contralateral hemisphere were significantly lower in the SIP group than in the non-SIP group. In SIP patients, infarctions were surrounded by larger hypoperfused areas than in non-SIP patients. These larger hypoperfused areas may result in pathological damage to the brain that is responsible for the progression of stroke.

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Affiliations

  1. Department of Neurology, the First Norman Bethune Hospital of Jilin University, Changchun, 130021, China

    Zhen-Ni Guo, Jiang Wu & Yi Yang

  2. Department of Geriatric Medicine, the Affiliated Hospital of Changchun University of Chinese Medicine, Changchun, 130021, China

    Ge Yang

  3. Department of Radiology, the First Norman Bethune Hospital of Jilin University, Changchun, 130021, China

    Hong-Wei Zhou & Jing Wang

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  1. Zhen-Ni Guo
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  2. Ge Yang
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  3. Hong-Wei Zhou
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  4. Jing Wang
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  5. Jiang Wu
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  6. Yi Yang
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Correspondence to Yi Yang.

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These authors contributed equally to this work.

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Guo, ZN., Yang, G., Zhou, HW. et al. Xenon-enhanced CT assessment of cerebral blood flow in stroke-in-progress patients with unilateral internal carotid artery or middle cerebral artery stenosis. Neurosci. Bull. 29, 693–700 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12264-013-1376-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12264-013-1376-1

Keywords

  • cerebral blood flow
  • stroke in progress
  • artery stenosis
  • xenon-enhanced CT
  • hypoperfusion