Acute phase reactants in patients with cerebrovascular accidents in neurologyward, Ali Ebn Abitaleb hospital, Rafsanjan, Iran

Introduction: Cerebrovascular accident (CVA) is the most important and prevalent disease of all neurological disorders in adults. It is also one of the most important causes of morbidity and mortality. The current study was conducted to evaluate some of the acute phase reactants in patients admitted for ischemic CVA in neurology ward. Methods: In this descriptive cross-sectional study, the data were collected through a questionnaire from the patients admitted in the neurology ward of Aliebn- abitaleb hospital in Rafsanjan, with primary clinical diagnosis of stroke and the net diagnosis of ischemic CVA according to their MRI reports, during the first 24 hours of their admission. Co-morbidities such as infectious diseases, inflammations and tumors were excluded from the study. The data were analyzed using EPI6 statistical software. Results: Some acute phase reactants including platelets (PLT), erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR), C-reactive protein (CRP), and white blood cell (WBC) were evaluated in 250 patients with ischemic CVA. 60.4% of the cases had a normal WBC count, while 39.6% showed abnormal WBC. CRP was negative in all the patients. Also PLT count was in a normal range for all the patients. 67.2% of the cases showed a normal ESR and 32.8% had abnormal ESR. Conclusion: In this study, the number of cases with abnormal WBC count and ESR was more than those reported in most previous researches. It could indicate the association of some acute phase reactants and thrombotic stroke. Lower ages of the patients with abnormal WBC in this study, may be due to the higher prevalence of vasculitic diseases at this range of age, or because of a delay in the inflammatory reactions at old ages