Characteristics of Posterior Cerebral Artery Infarction

J Korean Neurol Assoc > Volume 11(2); 1993 > Article

Journal of the Korean Neurological Association 1993;11(2): 157-163.

후뇌동맥경색의 원인적 고찰

송희정, 송인범,김재문

충남대학교 신경과.

Characteristics of Posterior Cerebral Artery Infarction

Jee-Jung Song, M.D., In-Beom Song, M.D., Jae-Moon Kim, M.D.

Department of Neurology, College of Medicine Choonnam National University

Abstract

With the purpose of clarifying the etiology and its characteristics of PCA infarction, we analyzed 60 consecutive patients with cerebral infarction involving occipital-or inferior temporal lobes. To elucidate the underlying causes of PCA infarcts, we reviewed medical records for clinical and laboratory risk factors, neuroimaging studies, echocardiog.ram, and angiographic findings. The com non causes of PCA infarcts were thrombotic, embolic, unknown, and miscellaneous causes in decreasing order. The most common symptom was hemianopsia or cortical blindness. Sensorimotor symptoms were present in 36 patients and confusion in 16 patients. Confusion was closely correlated with old age or infarcts outside the PCA territory(p<0.05). The patients of either thrombotic or embolic infarcts were older than those of miscellaneous or unknown causes(p<0.05). Bilateral occlusions were less common in thrombotic and embolic infarct in comparison with miscellaneous causes. Atrial fibrillation or sick sinus syndrome were the usual causes of embolic infarct. In miscellaneous causes of infarct, migraine were in four patients. Clinical outcome was better in unknown causes than in thrombotic or miscellaneous causes of infarct (p<0.05). These findings revealed that thrombosis was a worse prognostic factor than embolism as well as a leading cause of PCA infarct.