Neurologic outcomes after early surgery for infective endocarditis in patients with combined cerebral septic embolism

OBJECTIVES: This study followed the results of any development of neurologic outcomes according to the presence or absence of cerebral stroke in infective endocarditis patients after early cardiac surgery. We also analysed the neurologic outcomes regardless of cerebral microbleeds in cerebral embolic patients after cardiac surgery. METHODS: We retrospectively studied 55 patients with left-sided infective endocarditis who underwent early surgery and hospitalization between May 2010 and May 2015. Preoperatively, there were 33 patients in the cerebral embolic group and 22 patients in the nonembolic event group. Among the cerebral embolic patients, 13 patients had additional cerebral microbleeds on brain imaging. RESULTS: After cardiac surgery, intracranial haemorrhage and haemorrhagic complications occurred in 2 patients (9.1%) in the nonembolic group and 5 patients (15.1%) in the embolic group. There was no statistically significant difference in postoperative neurologic problems between the non-embolic group and the embolic group (22.7% vs 30.3%, respectively, P = 0.54). Early mortality was 4.5% in the non-embolic group and 9.1% in the embolic group (P = 1.00). In the cerebral microbleeds combined with septic embolism group, the neurologic problem rate (38.5%) was higher than in the non-cerebral microbleeds group (20.0%), but the difference was not statistically significant. CONCLUSIONS: Our analysis showed that the rate of postoperative neurologic problems was not high in patients with cerebral septic embolism. Despite this, early surgery is not contraindicated in cerebral septic emboli patients. Cerebral microbleeds related to septic embolism were suspected to increase the rate of neurologic problems after cardiac surgery. So, further studies are needed to assess about the influence of cerebral microbleeds in cardiac operation.