Prognostic Factors of Motor Recovery after Stereotactic Evacuation of Intracerebral Hematoma

Spontaneous intracerebral hemorrhage represents 20 to 30% of all stroke patients in Japan. However, the treatment strategy of intracerebral hematoma remains controversial. Stereotactic hematoma evacuation is minimally invasive surgery and is beneficial for clot removal with limited tissue damage. The purpose of this study was to investigate the factors affecting motor recovery after stereotactic hematoma evacuation. This retrospective analysis included 30 patients with spontaneous thalamic or putaminal hemorrhage who underwent stereotactic hematoma evacuation. We compared age, presurgical muscle strength, hematoma volume and removal rate between the patients who showed improvement of motor function (improved group) and the patients associated with no motor improvement (unchanged group). Twenty-one patients were classified into the improved group and nine patients into the unchanged group. Statistical analysis revealed that age in the improved group was significantly younger than in the unchanged group (p < 0.01), whereas there was no significant difference in presurgical muscle strength, hematoma volume and removal rate between the two groups. The present results revealed that stereotactic hematoma evacuation is attributable to the improvement of motor function, especially in the younger population, indicating the importance of cortical reorganization during post-surgical rehabilitation. In addition, this procedure could provide functional improvement in severely disabled patients. Proper patient selection to receive this therapy would be beneficial for further advances of this technique. The present result might be useful in elucidating the mechanism of motor recovery and proper patient selection for this technique.