02 Mar 24. Featured Paper

Is incidentally discovered covert cerebrovascular disease ignorable?

Link to paper on JAMA Neurology

Authors

Thomas R Meinel,  Joanna M. Wardlaw, David M Kent

Covert cerebrovascular disease (CCD) is a remarkably common, age-related phenomenon affecting more than 30% of those 70 years and older using screening magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in population-based research cohorts. Yet translating findings from population-based screening studies to clinical care is not straightforward, since CCD findings only come to clinical attention when they are incidentally discovered on neuroimaging, typically CT, obtained for other clinical indications. Furthermore, CCD includes disparate pathologies; cortical infarcts generally have atherothromboembolic sources and well-established evidence-based secondary prevention for their symptomatic counterparts, whereas the far more common white matter disease and lacunes are features of intrinsic small vessel disease (SVD), for which evidence-based therapies are less established.

Keywords:

• Covert cerebrovascular disease
• Magnetic resonance imaging
• White matter disease