WEDNESDAY, Oct. 8 (HealthDay News) -- There are significant racial differences in both the occurrence and topography of microbleeds in patients with primary intracerebral hemorrhage, and microbleeds may become a promising imaging biomarker related to intracerebral hemorrhage pathophysiology, prognosis, disease progression and therapeutic strategies, according to a report in the Oct. 7 issue of Neurology.
B.R. Copenhaver, of Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., and colleagues examined how the rates, risk factors and topography of microbleeds vary by race in patients hospitalized for primary intracerebral hemorrhage. Patients from two metropolitan stroke centers with a primary intracerebral hemorrhage diagnosis had clinical and neuroimaging data recorded. Data was analyzed comparing baseline characteristics and imaging findings by race.
Overall, 87 patients were included (42 black, 45 white) with the black cohort being both younger and more likely to have hypertension. Seventy-four percent of blacks were noted to have one or more microbleeds compared to 42 percent of whites, and the black population was more likely to have a microbleed in multiple territories compared to the white population (38 percent versus 22 percent). After adjustment for age, hypertension and alcohol use, the odds of a microbleed were still 3.3 times higher in the black population compared to the white population.
"The increased frequency of microbleeds in the black population likely reflects the underlying etiology and control (or lack thereof) of risk factors for hemorrhage," the authors conclude. "The results of the current study suggest that the burden of vasculopathic disease in black patients may be even greater than previously believed compared with white patients and can be well quantified on MR imaging."
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