Effects of COVID-19 pandemic on acute ischemic stroke care

Introduction: Early international observations report decreased number of acute ischemic stroke admissions and prolonged onset-to-treatment times during COVID-19 pandemic. Aim: Our goal was to assess the effect of COVID-19 pandemic on Hungarian acute ischemic stroke care. Method: We compared demographical and clinical characteristics, rate of intravenous and endovascular therapies and therapeutic time parameters of acute ischemic strokes admitted to a university stroke centre in a COVID-epidemic period (01/03/2020-30/04/2020) and an identical period of 2019. Results: 86 patients were admitted during the COVID-period and 97 in the control period. Demographical and clinical characteristics of these periods were well-balanced. In the COVID-period, the proportion of patients arriving beyond 24 hours after onset increased by 13% (p = 0.046), the rate of endovascular interventions remained unchanged (8%), the rate of intravenous thrombolysis decreased from 26% to 16%, the mean onset-to-treatment time of thrombolysis increased by 20 minutes, while the mean door-to-treatment time increased by only 5 minutes. Behind the shift of arrival time categories, multivariable (year of examination, NIHSS, age) logistic regression shows that the year of examination might play a leading role (p = 0.096). Conclusion: In the COVID-period, admissions for acute ischemic strokes decreased by 11% and the proportion of cases certainly untreatable by reperfusion therapies (arriving beyond 24 hours after onset) increased significantly. While the rate of endovascular interventions remained unchanged, the absolute rate of intravenous thrombolysis decreased by 10% and the mean onset-to-treatment time showed a tendency to increase. In these changes, the COVID-epidemic itself and related out-of-hospital factors might play a leading role.