Diabetic patients are at a higher risk of lacunar infarction and dyslipidemia: results of a comparative pilot study from King Fahad Hospital of the University, Saudi Arabia

OBJECTIVE To describe the various risk factors and identify the characteristics of ischemic stroke in diabetic patients. METHODS A retrospective study carried out at King Fahd Hospital of the University in Al-Khobar, kingdom of Saudi Arabia from February 2010 to December 2015. Statistical analysis was performed by the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (version 22.0, SPSS Inc, Chicago, IL, USA). RESULTS One hundred and twenty-seven diabetic patients with ischemic stroke were compared with 127 non-diabetics. Mean age was 61+/-13.6 (mean+/-SD) years for diabetics and 60+/-16.6 years for non-diabetics. There were 68.5% male in the diabetic group and 62.2% in the non-diabetic group. Small vessel occlusion was the most common subtype (41.7%) in diabetics and stroke of undetermined etiology (32%) in non-diabetics. Dyslipidemia was significantly more prevalent in diabetics as compared with non-diabetics. CONCLUSION Our study found significant differences in characteristics of ischemic stroke in diabetics compared with non-diabetics with dyslipidemia, microangiopathy, and lacunar infarction being more frequent. Further epidemiological studies are required to understand the characteristics of strokes in diabetics.