Effect of nutritional status control (CONUT) index on clinical outcome of contact aspiration method in acute ischemic stroke patients

AIM: Stroke presents with sudden neurological symptoms and functional loss lasting more than 24 hours, sometimes leading to death. The aim of this study was to determine the clinical outcomes of patients who underwent endovascular treatment for acute ischemic stroke and to investigate the effect of the Controlling Nutritional Status (CONUT) score on these outcomes. METHOD: This retrospective study included patients who presented to the Sakarya Education and Research Hospital Neurology Clinic between December 2019 and December 2022 and underwent endovascular treatment for acute ischemic stroke. The clinical status of the patients after the endovascular treatment, the modified Rankin Scale (mRS) score at 90 days, and radiological outcomes (mTICI 2b/2c/3) were evaluated. The effect of the CONUT (Controlling Nutritional Status) score on these outcomes was retrospectively investigated. RESULTS: A total of 195 patients, including 99 females and 96 males, were included in the study. The mean age was 67.6 ± 11.5 years. The absence of obesity and diabetes mellitus (DM), a lower NIHSS score at 24 hours, administration of intravenous tPA, good collateral circulation, short reperfusion time, low first-pass and pass numbers, absence of type 3 aortic arch, an mTICI 2b/2c/3 score, high HDL levels, and low CRP, neutrophil, and monocyte levels were associated with better outcomes. According to the Conut index, no statistically significant difference was observed in the 90-day mRS-death rates between the normal and abnormal groups (p>0.05). CONCLUSION: Many factors influence the success of reperfusion therapies in stroke patients. Malnutrition is a common problem in stroke patients, both premorbid and after the onset of the disease. Future studies evaluating the nutritional status of these patients at the time of presentation to stroke centers and developing scoring systems for this purpose will contribute to determining the long-term prognosis of stroke patients.