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. 2022 Mar;56(1):28-37.
doi: 10.4314/gmj.v56i1.5.

Computed tomography patterns of intracranial infarcts in a Ghanaian tertiary facility

Emmanuel K M Edzie  1   2 , Klenam Dzefi-Tettey  3 , Philip N Gorleku  1 , Edmund K Brakohiapa  4 , Peter Appiah-Thompson  5 , Kwasi Agyen-Mensah  6   7 , Michael K Amedi  8 , Frank Quarshie  9 , Evans Boadi  2 , Joshua M Kpobi  2 , Richard A Edzie  1 , Abdul R Asemah  1
Affiliations

Computed tomography patterns of intracranial infarcts in a Ghanaian tertiary facility

Emmanuel K M Edzie et al. Ghana Med J. 2022 Mar.

Abstract

Objective: To determine the Computed Tomography (CT) patterns of intracranial infarcts.

Design: A retrospective cross-sectional study.

Setting: The CT scan unit of the Radiology Department, Cape Coast Teaching Hospital (CCTH), from February 2017 to February 2021.

Participants: One thousand, one hundred and twenty-five patients with non-contrast head CT scan diagnosis of ischaemic strokes, consecutively selected over the study period without any exclusions.

Main outcome measures: Patterns of non-contrast head CT scan of ischaemic strokes.

Results: About 50.6% of the study participants were females with an average age of 62.59±13.91 years. Males were affected with ischaemic strokes earlier than females (p<0.001). The risk factors considered were, hyperlipidaemia (59.5%), hypertension (49.0%), Type 2 diabetes mellitus (DM-2) (39.6%) and smoking (3.0%). The three commonest ischaemic stroke CT scan features were wedge-shaped hypodensity extending to the edge of the brain (62.8%), sulcal flattening/effacement (57.6%) and loss of grey-white matter differentiation (51.0%), which were all significantly associated with hypertension. Small deep brain hypodensities, the rarest feature (2.2%), had no significant association with any of the risk factors considered in the study.

Conclusion: Apart from the loss of grey-white matter differentiation, there was no significant association between the other CT scan features and sex. Generally, most of the risk factors and the CT scan features were significantly associated with increasing age.

Funding: None declared.

Keywords: Brain; Computed Tomography; Ghana; Intracranial Infarcts; Patterns.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflict of interest: None declared

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
An axial non-enhanced CT scan of the brain showing an extensive area of hypodensity in the region of the left temporoparietal brain with associated sulcal flattening/effacement (wedge-shaped hypodensity extending to the edge of the brain) shown with red arrow, and at the basal ganglia areas (significant deep brain hypodensities) worse on the left shown with green arrows, in keeping with acute bilateral basal ganglia and left temporoparietal infarcts.
Figure 2
Figure 2
An axial non-enhanced CT scan of the brain showing an extensive area of hypodensity at the left basal ganglia (significant deep brain hypodensity with loss of grey-white matter differentiation and blurring of the internal capsule) shown with blue arrow in keeping with extensive acute right basal ganglia infarct.
Figure 3
Figure 3
An axial non-enhanced CT scan of the brain showing an area of hypodensity at the right basal ganglia (small deep brain hypodensity) consistent with acute right basal ganglia infarct (shown with yellow arrow).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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