Women's first stroke more severe and disabling than men's.

2003 JUL 3 - (NewsRx.com & NewsRx.net) -- Women have more severe first strokes at an older age than men and remain more disabled, researchers reported in the June 13, 2003, rapid access issue of Stroke.

The study also found gender differences in risk factors, stroke effects, complication rates, and length of hospital stay.

Women in the study had higher rates of atrial fibrillation (AF), an irregular heart rhythm in which the two upper heart chambers quiver instead of beating effectively, says Jaume Roquer, MD, PhD, of the Servei de Neurologia at the Hospital del Mar in Barcelona, Spain.

Blood that isn't pumped completely out of the chamber can pool and form clots that may travel to the brain, causing a cardioembolic stroke. AF can be treated with anticoagulants (blood thinners), which reduce the likelihood that blood will clot.

"One of the most important therapeutic conclusions of our study is the necessity of increasing the use of preventive anticoagulation treatment in patients at risk for a cardioembolism, especially in women, because their frequency of atrial fibrillation is greater," Roquer says. "Better control of hypertension should also be another important therapeutic goal to decrease the incidence of stroke in women."

In the United States, stroke is the third-leading cause of death. Women accounted for 61.4% of U.S. stroke deaths in the year 2000, according to the American Heart Association.

Noting that few studies that analyzed stroke in women included vascular risk factors, the origin of the stroke, clinical presentation, and outcome, Roquer and colleagues studied all first acute stroke patients (1,581) admitted to their institution between December 1995 and January 2002. Patients underwent routine blood analysis, brain imaging, an electrocardiogram, and ...