Coronavirus disease 2019 in patients with prior ischemic stroke

Objective: A novel coronavirus, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), emerged in December 2019 and soon led to a worldwide pandemic, coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). COVID-19 has been shown to cause several neurological manifestations including ischemic strokes. Stroke is one of the chronic diseases with very high morbidity and mortality causing a huge financial burden to the healthcare economy. The purpose of this study is to explore if patients with prior ischemic stroke are a vulnerable population for worse clinical outcomes in patients with COVID-19. Background: It is uncertain if patients with prior ischemic stroke are vulnerable to coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and its complications. Design/Methods: We used TriNetX, a global health collaborative clinical research platform with a large global COVID-19 database. COVID-19 infection was identified with a positive lab value for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) and related ribonucleic acid (RNA). Results: A total of 604,258 patients with history of ischemic stroke were identified, of which 891 patients (study cohort) were diagnosed with COVID-19. A control cohort with 32,136 patients diagnosed with COVID-19 after January 20th 2020 without a history of ischemic stroke were identified. A comparison between study cohort and control cohort showed patients with prior history of stroke (study cohort) were older (69.5 vs 47.8; p Conclusions: Patients with history of ischemic stroke tend to be significantly older with several comorbid conditions contributing to worse clinical outcomes after COVID-19, which makes them a vulnerable population. Disclosure: Dr. Gil Tommee has nothing to disclose. Dr. Nalleballe has nothing to disclose. Suman Siddamreddy has nothing to disclose. Dr. Sheng has nothing to disclose. Dr. Dandu has nothing to disclose. Dr. Arulprakash has nothing to disclose. Dr. Kovvuru has nothing to disclose. Mudassar Kamran has nothing to disclose. Dr. Jasti has nothing to disclose. Dr. Onteddu has nothing to disclose.