Analysis of Sociodemographic and Clinical Factors Associated with Hospitalized Stroke Patients of Bangladesh

A hospital based cross sectional study was carried out to analyze prevalence of risk factors for stroke in hospitalized patient in a medical college hospital. 100 patients were chosen using purposive sampling technique. Highest incidence of stroke was between the 6th and 7th decade. Patients came from both urban (54%) and rural (46%) areas and most of them belong to the low-income group (47%). In occupational category; service holder (28%) and retired person (21%) were the highest groups. Most of the study subjects were literate (63%). CT scan study revealed that the incidence of ischaemic stroke was 61% and haemorrhagic stroke 39%. Analysis indicated hypertension as major risk factor for stroke (63%) and major portion of the patients (42.85%) were on irregular or no treatment. Twenty four percent of the patients had heart diseases and out of 24 patients 45.83% were suffering from ischaemic heart disease. The present study detected diabetes in 21% patients. Fifty three percent of the study subjects were smoker, 39% patients had habit of betelnut chewing. Out of 26 female patients, only 23% had history of using oral contraceptives. Majority of the patients were sedentary workers (46%). Thirty seven percent of the stroke patients were obese. Among the stroke patients 9% had previous history of stroke and 3% had TIA respectively. Most of the patients (21%) were awake while they suffered from stroke and the time of occurrence was mostly in the afternoon (46%). This study found that hypertension, cigarette smoking, ischaemic heart disease and diabetes mellitus are the major risk factors prevalent in our community while other risk factors demand further study.