Background/Purpose: To assess the characteristics, interventions, and outcomes of cerebrovascular accidents (CVAs) in people with giant cell arteritis (GCA). Strokes are uncommon in this population, however, it is uncertain whether patients with GCA are at a higher risk of stroke compared to the general population.

Methods: A retrospective cohort study was performed by analyzing the National Inpatient Sample (NIS) 2017-2022 for all patients with GCA, GCA with Polymyalgia Rheumatica (PMR), and Cerebral Infarction as primary or secondary diagnoses via ICD-10 (International Classification of Diseases 10th Revision) codes. Frequencies, demographics, and trends were determined and compared between hospitalized patients with GCA or GCA with PMR and those without GCA or GCA with PMR. STATA version 17 was used for data analysis. A p-value of ≤0.05 was considered statistically significant.

Results: Hospitalized patients with stroke who had GCA or GCA with PMR were less likely to be male (32.7% vs. 50.5%, p < 0.001), less likely to have history of smoking (12.57% vs 19.73%, p < 0.001), more likely to have concomitant hypertension (89% vs 84.45%, p < 0.001 or concomitant peripheral vascular disease (15.26% vs 9.61%, p < 0.001), less likely to undergo intravenous thrombolysis (4.7% vs 8.5%, p < 0.001), and less likely to undergo mechanical thrombectomy (2.8% vs 4.9%, p < 0.001), have a higher mortality (5.16% vs 4.65%, p=0.045) when compared to hospitalized patients with stroke who do not have GCA or GCA with PMR.

Conclusion: Hospitalized patients with stroke who had GCA or GCA with PMR were more likely to be female, older in age, have concomitant hypertension and less likely to undergo mechanical thrombectomy or intravenous thrombolysis when compared to patients with stroke without GCA or GCA with PMR. The cohort with GCA or GCA with PMR also had higher mortality when compared to the cohort without GCA or GCA with PMR.

Table 1: Characteristics of Hospitalized Stroke Patients with and without GCA or GCA with PMR

Table 2: Multivariate Regression Analysis of Outcomes Among GCA or GCA with PMR Patients Admitted With Stroke

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ACR Meeting Abstracts - https://acrabstracts.org/abstract/cerebrovascular-accidents-in-patients-with-giant-cell-arteritis-a-population-based-retrospective-cohort-study/