Prevalence of the most common comorbidities in a cohortof elderly patients affected by acute ischemic stroke

Background: Acute ischemic stroke(AIS) is common among elderlypatients,affecting 6,5% of the population aged 64-85 years,representing the third cause of death among old subjects.Materials and Methods: 294 consecutive patients admitted to ourInternal Medicine Unit (IM) for AIS were enrolled. Age, sex, lenght ofadmission, in-hospital mortality and comorbidities (hypertension,diabetes, chronic cardiopathy,atrial fibrillation(AF), dyslipidemia, activecancer, COPD, chronic kidney disease (CKD) and dementia) werecollected. Trend of days of hospitalization in relation with the numberof comorbidities was evaluated with ANOVA. Statistical analysis wasperformed with SPSS 13.0.Results: Mean age was 82,37(±9,19) years. Mean length of stay inIM was 9,8 7(±7,14) days.In-hospital mortality was 7,1%.Hypertension was present in 54%, diabetes in 18%, dyslipidemia in11,9%, chronic cardiopathy in 36,4%, AF in 18,4%, cancer in 4,1%,COPD in 10,5%, CKD in 21,7% and cognitive deterioration in 13,3%of the sample. 93,4% of the patients had at least one comorbidity,with a median of two concomitant pathologies at the admission in IM.We observed a linear trend in the days of admission proportional tothe increasing number of comorbidities(from 7,35±3,97 days, nocomorbidities to 16,00±12,52 days, ≥4 comorbidities; p<0.05).84,6% of AIS-related deaths happened in patients with at least onecomorbidity,and 46,1% had 2 or 3 comorbidities. Conclusions: Comorbidities are common in elderly AIS patients.Increased number of comorbidities is associated to a longer admissionand an higher risk of death.