Objectives: Socioeconomic status (SES) and lifestyle have impact on recovery after ischaemic stroke (IS) and on risk of recurrent ischaemic stroke (RIS) in elderly patients. With regard to currently available limited data on young people, we aimed to assess SES and parameters of lifestyle and evaluate their relationship to stroke recovery and risk of RIS in young patients.
Methods: We analysed consecutive young IS patients < 50 years enrolled in the prospective HISTORY (Heart and Ischaemic STrOke Relationship studY) study registered on ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT01541163). Data were acquired from structured a self-evaluating multiple-choice questionnaire. Clinical outcome was assessed using the Modified Rankin Scale (MRS) after 3 months with score 0-1 for excellent outcome.
Results: Data were obtained from 297 (163 males, mean age 39.6 ± 7.8 years) young patients. Patients with MRS 0-1 (237, 79.8%) did not differ in SES except university education (21.1 vs. 3.3%; p = 0.001), less smoked (16.5 vs. 58.3%; p < 0.001), more of them did regular sport activities (79.1 vs. 51.6%; p = 0.02) and passed regular preventive medical checks (45.6 vs. 24.2%; p = 0.01). Twelve (4%) patients suffered from RIS during a follow-up with median of 25 months. They did not differ in SES but had higher body mass index (31.6 vs. 26.7; p = 0.007), reported less regular sport activities (16.7 vs. 73.0%; p < 0.001) and less regular medical checks (8.3 vs. 40.0%; p = 0.001).
Conclusion: In young patients, SES had no relationship to clinical outcome after IS and to risk of RIS except education level. Some parameters of health lifestyle were presented more in patients with excellent outcome and without RIS during the follow-up.
Keywords: ischaemic stroke; lifestyle; outcome; recurrent ischaemic stroke; socioeconomic status; young.