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Original Article
Introduction
Stroke, after heart diseases and cancer is the
third leading cause of death world wide.1 Stroke is also
a leading cause of functional impairments, with 20% of
survivors requiring institutional care after 3 months and
15-30% gets permanently disabled.2 Of all strokes, 88%
are classified as ischemic, and the remainders are
hemorrhagic, either subarachnoid (9%) or intracerebral
(3%).3 Ischemic
stroke
is
mostly
due
to
thromboembolism secondary to atherosclerosis in the
major arteries. Other causes include infarction due to
embolism from heart and intrinsic disease of the small
perforating vessels. Nikolai first proposed a link between
cholesterol and atherosclerosis in 1912.4 Kunitomo M. et
al worked on mice in Japan and found that
atherosclerotic lesions are formed in the aorta of mice
fed a high-cholesterol and high-linoleic diet, in parallel
with elevated serum lipid peroxide levels.5 Abnormalities
of serum lipids are major risk factors for coronary heart
disease and most recently established as risk factor in
cerebrovascular disease.6 Studies have shown that
lowering cholesterol may decrease carotid atheroma
thus resulting in a decline in carotid territory infarcts.6
Two prospective studies in men subsequently
Ann. Pak. Inst. Med. Sci. 2008;4(3): 165-167
165
Results
A total of 60 patients were admitted during the
period of study; seven of them were excluded, as 2 had
myocardial infarction with left ventricular failure, 1
patient had SLE, 1 patient was a case of brain
metastasis, 2 patients had infective endocarditis and 1
patient had an episode of stroke a year back. Amongst a
total of 53 patients selected, 21(40%) were females and
32(60 %) males (Table1).
60
7
53
21
32
22
19
9
Discussion
Stroke continues to have a great impact on
public health. Stroke is frequent, recurring, and is more
often disabling than fatal. Although some determinants
166
References
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Conclusion
Our study although had a small no of sample
size and was over a short period of 60 days has results
similar to that of the western studies revealing
association of 15.4% to 30% of dyslipedemia to the
ischemic stroke. It also shows that not only high levels
of LDL,TG and cholesterol but low levels of good
cholesterol, HDL, is also associated with atherosclerosis
and in turn stroke. There is need of educating people
regarding there dietary habits and life style to reduce the
incidence of this disabling disease as prevention is
better than cure.
15.
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167