Clinical Outcomes in Basal Ganglia Strokes Treated With Mechanical Thrombectomy

BackgroundBasal ganglia infarcts are thought to carry worse clinical outcomes compared with other infarct patterns. We aimed to investigate whether pretreatment topographic infarct patterns including complete basal ganglia involvement versus other infarct patterns help predict mechanical thrombectomy outcomes.MethodsThis was a review of a prospectively collected database of consecutive mechanical thrombectomy patients with anterior circulation large vessel occlusion strokes between January 2014 and November 2018. Patients were categorized into the following 2 groups: (1) total basal ganglia (TBG) strokes defined as infarcts affecting both the caudate and lentiform nuclei regardless of cortical involvement and (2) other infarct patterns. Infarct location was assessed on preprocedure noncontrast computed tomography using an automated software (e‐ASPECTS). Baseline characteristics and outcome measures were compared.ResultsA total of 1011 patients were analyzed of which 234 (23.12%) had TBG strokes. Patients with TBG strokes were younger (P=0.01); had higher National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS) (P=0.006), lower e‐ASPECTS (P