Impact of Spot Sign Etiology in Supratentorial Intracerebral Hemorrhage on Outcomes of Endoscopic Surgery

BACKGROUND: The spot sign (SS) in spontaneous intracerebral hemorrhage has been reported to be a predictive factor of poor outcome; however, how SS is related with the clinical outcome remains unclear. We aimed to investigate how etiology associated with SS affects the clinical outcome of endoscopic surgery. METHODS: We retrospectively analyzed data from 104 patients (43 women and 61 men, mean age: 64.2 +/- 11.0 years) who underwent endoscopic surgery for supratentorial intracerebral hemorrhage. The outcome variables analyzed were in-hospital mortality and modified Rankin scale score at 90 days from onset. RESULTS: The prevalence of intraventricular hemorrhage and the mean initial modified Graeb score were greater in SS-positive than in SS-negative patients (100% vs. 47.7%, P < 0.001, and 14.4 +/- 5.4 vs. 10.6 +/- 6.0, P = 0.03, respectively). Postoperative rebleeding occurred more frequently in SS-positive than -negative patients (25.0% vs. 6.8%, P = 0.045). The in-hospital mortality rate was 7.7% and was not significantly different between the groups (18.8% vs. 5.7%, P = 0.09). There was a significant unfavorable shift in modified Rankin scale scores at 90 days among SS-positive patients compared with SS-negative patients in an analysis with ordinal logistic regression (adjusted common odds ratio, 4.38; 95% confidence interval 0.06-0.79, P = 0.02). CONCLUSIONS: Intraventricular hemorrhage and postoperative rebleeding were considered to be associated with the poor outcome in patients with SS. The SS on computed tomography angiography may be valuable in predicting rebleeding and clinical outcome after surgery.