62 persons had COVID-related stroke in Bengaluru from June to August

As many as 62 folks recognized with COVID-19 suffered a stroke in the town throughout the an infection between June and August. Of these 16% died in hospital, a research by medical doctors from St (*62*)’s Medical College Hospital has revealed.

The multi-centre retrospective research from 13 hospitals has been accepted for publication in the International Journal of Stroke, the official publication of the World Stroke Organization.

A stroke is the sudden onset of neurological deficit due to vascular causes.

Thomas Mathew, Professor and Head of the division of Neurology at St. (*62*)’s Medical College Hospital, who’s the principal investigator of the research, advised The Hindu that COVID-19 associated strokes (CORS) are related to elevated mortality and morbidity.

“We found that mortality among the 62 CORS was high compared to the non-COVID-19 strokes diagnosed during the corresponding period last year. While 111 suffered a stroke from June to August last year according to St. John’s Stroke Registry, no death was reported,” he mentioned.

Of the 62 CORS, 60 (97%) sufferers had ischemic strokes whereas two (3%) had haemorrhagic strokes. A majority of them (59.7%) had a “bad” stroke whereby the massive artery was blocked.

The imply age of sufferers was 55.66 with an ordinary deviation of 13.20 years. While 34 (77.4%) had been male sufferers, 26 % (16/62) of sufferers didn’t have any standard danger elements for stroke.

Risk elements

Attributing CORS in these with out danger elements to irritation triggered thrombosis and injury to endothelium due to COVID-19, Dr. Mathew mentioned: “However, in the remaining 46 patients, 54.8% had diabetes, 61.3% had hypertension, 8% had coronary artery disease, and 4.8% had atrial fibrillation.”

Manifestations

City-based neurologists mentioned they had been seeing varied neurological manifestations of COVID-19.

Amit Kulkarni, advisor neurologist at SPASRH Hospital, mentioned with COVID-19 the issue was not simply the sequelae of lung involvement but in addition different different features like clotting occurring in the arteries of the lung, arteries of the mind, veins in the leg and venous sinuses in the mind, inflicting deep vein thrombosis, pulmonary embolism, arterial and venous strokes in the mind.

“What is also unusual about this disease is the varied immunological manifestations like limp paralysis of arms and legs (Guillian Barre syndrome), facial paralysis with asymmetry, cranial nerve palsies causing double vision, drooping of the eye and muscle involvement (myositis). We have noted quite a few peripheral nerve palsies presenting with foot drop in patients recently affected or recovering from COVID (inability to extend the foot) where the other routine blood work is negative for any connective tissue disease and there is no spinal/peripheral cause of nerve compression,” he mentioned.

G.T. Subhas, former president of Bangalore Stroke Support Group and former director of Bangalore Medical College and Research Institute mentioned the frequent signs of stroke could be remembered by Facial Drooping, Arm Weakness, Speech Difficulties and Time to attain a stroke prepared hospital abbreviated as FAST.

Do not ignore

“Both during and post COVID-19, people should not ignore warning signs such as dizziness, sudden weakness in limbs and difficulty in speaking or understanding words. “Patients should reach the hospital within three or four hours of the stroke. The earlier the patient is rushed to a hospital, the better the outcome,” he added.

Hospitals that had been a part of the research included St. (*62*)’s, Bengaluru Medical College and Research Institute, Manipal Hospitals, Sakra, Apollo, M.S. Ramaiah, Satya Sai Institute of Higher Medical Sciences, and Narayana Health.