Epidemiology and risk factors for stroke in young individuals: implications for prevention.

Hussain A, Lee M, Rana J, Virani SS. Epidemiology and risk factors for stroke in young individuals: implications for prevention. Current Opinion in Cardiology. 2021 Sep 1; 36(5):565-571.

Related HSR&D Project(s)

• IIR 16-072 – Determining and targeting reasons for low statin use to improve guideline-concordant statin therapy in high-risk patients

Dimensions for VA is a web-based tool available to VA staff that enables detailed searches of published research and research projects.

If you have VA-Intranet access, click here for more information vaww.hsrd.research.va.gov/dimensions/

VA staff not currently on the VA network can access Dimensions by registering for an account using their VA email address.    Search Dimensions for VA for this citation
* Don't have VA-internal network access or a VA email address? Try searching the free-to-the-public version of Dimensions

Search for Abstract from PubMed

---

Abstract:

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: Summarize and examine the epidemiology, etiologies, risk factors, and treatment of stroke among young adults and highlight the importance of early recognition, treatment, and primordial prevention of risk factors that lead to stroke. RECENT FINDINGS: Incidence of stroke, predominantly ischemic, among young adults has increased over the past two decades. This parallels an increase in traditional risk factors such as hypertension, diabetes, and use of tobacco, and use of illicit substances among young stroke patients. Compared to older patients, there is a much higher proportion of intracerebral and subarachnoid hemorrhage in young adults. The cause of ischemic stroke in young adults is also more diverse compared to older adults with 1/3rd classified as stroke of undetermined etiology due to inadequate effort or time spent on investigating these diverse and rare etiologies. Young premature Atherosclerotic Cardiovascular Disease patients have suboptimal secondary prevention care compared to older patients with lower use of antiplatelets and statin therapy and lower adherence to statins. SUMMARY: Among young patients, time-critical diagnosis and management remain challenging, due to atypical stroke presentations, vast etiologies, statin hesitancy, and provider clinical inertia. Early recognition and aggressive risk profile modification along with primary and secondary prevention therapy optimization are imperative to reduce the burden of stroke among young adults and save potential disability-adjusted life years.