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One hundred consecutive cases with an admitting diagnosis of cerebrovascular disease treated in a four-bed Stroke Intensive Care Unit were reviewed in regard to final diagnosis and outcome. Eleven had final diagnoses other than cerebrovascular disease. Eighty-one had specific diagnoses as to major type of cerebrovascular disease present. The outcome in these cases was compared with that of 81 control cases matched for diagnosis only and blindly selected from concurrent admissions to an adjacent neurological ward. No significant differences in overall mortality (33% versus 27%) or in mortality by diagnostic category were found. This was true even if deaths in the first 48 hours were omitted from both groups to compensate for the selective admission of more seriously ill patients to the Stroke Intensive Care Unit. These results are compared to those reported by others. We concluded that specialized stroke intensive care units modeled on coronary care units do not have a significant impact on acute stroke mortality.
Pitner et al. (Sat,) studied this question.