Elevated plasma total cholesterol level is associated with the risk of asymptomatic intracranial arterial stenosis

• Published in: PloS one 2014-07, Vol.9 (7), p.e101232-e101232
• Main Authors: Shen, Yuan, Wang, Jing, Wu, Jianwei, Qu, Weikai, Wang, Chunxue, Gao, Xiang, Zhou, Yong, Wang, Anxin, Wu, Shouling, Zhao, Xingquan
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adult; Age; Age Factors; Antilipemic agents; Arterial stenosis; Atherosclerosis; Biology and Life Sciences; Blood cholesterol; Chinese medicine; Cholesterol; Cholesterol - blood; Cohort Studies; Constriction, Pathologic - diagnosis; Constriction, Pathologic - epidemiology; Correlation; Correlation analysis; Diabetes; Diabetes Mellitus, Type 2 - complications; Doppler effect; Dyslipidemia; Family medical history; Female; Flow velocity; Hospitals; Humans; Hypertension; Hypertension - complications; Intracranial Arterial Diseases - complications; Intracranial Arterial Diseases - diagnosis; Intracranial Arterial Diseases - epidemiology; Laboratories; Lipoproteins; Logistic Models; Male; Males; Medical imaging; Medicine and Health Sciences; Middle Aged; Neurology; Odds Ratio; Population; Prevalence; Regression analysis; Risk analysis; Risk Factors; Sex Factors; Smoking; Stenosis; Stroke; Subgroups; Ultrasonography, Doppler, Transcranial; Ultrasound; Ultrasound imaging; Veins & arteries; Womens health
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0101232

Intracranial arterial stenosis (ICAS) is one of the most common causes of stroke, and dyslipidemia was one of the most common risk factors related to ICAS. However, the correlation between the plasma total cholesterol level (PTC) and ICAS, especially asymptomatic ICAS (AICAS) is not clear. 5,300 participants were enrolled in this study. The diagnosis of AICAS was made by transcranial Doppler ultrasonography. The participants were then divided into 5 essentially equal-sized groups based on their PTC levels. The multivariate logistic regression was used to analyze the correlation between the PTC level and the prevalence of AICAS. 13.0% of the participants were diagnosed with AICAS. The prevalence of AICAS gradually increased with the increasing PTC level. After adjusted by the possible confounding factors, the Odds Ratios (OR) of the AICAS prevalence between the 1st quintile group and the other 4 groups were 1.13, 1.23, 1.63 and 1.75 with 95% confident intervals (CI) of 0.84-1.52, 0.91-1.66, 1.20-2.22 and 1.23-2.47, respectively. The further subgroup analysis revealed that the PTC level was stronger for males (OR 1.42 95%CI 1.23-1.64), regarding the prevalence of AICAS. In this large community-based study, the prevalence of AICAS is 13.0%, subjects with higher PTC levels showed a mild increase in the prevalence of AICAS. The PTC level is an independent risk factor of AICAS. Males seem to be significantly more vulnerable to the risk of AICAS.