Abstract : Introduction: Stroke is one of the most common causes of high mortality rates in Africa with many unknown
aspects around its prognosis. In this study we aim to describe stroke characteristics and in-hospital mortality of
stroke in Parakou.
Methods: This is a retrospective cohort study including all stroke patients admitted to the Department of
Neurology at Parakou Teaching Hospital from January 1, 2013 through to December 31, 2019. Clinical data,
vascular risk factors, stroke subtype and outcome data were recorded. The in-hospital case-fatality and its
associated factors were determined. The study was approved by the Local Ethics Committee of Biomedical
research and has been registered under the unique indentifying number researchregistry5687 and is available at
https://www.researchregistry.com/browse-the-registry#home/
Results: Stroke cases represented 51.5% of all patients. There were 372 patients included in the study with a mean
age of 58.2 � 14.2 years. The sex ratio was 1:3. Ischemic stroke accounted for 40.3%, intracerebral hemorrhage
30.4%, and unknown 29.3%. The main vascular risk factors were hypertension (69.1%), alcoholism (23.9%) and
diabetes mellitus (16.9%). The mean NIHSS at admission was 9.4 � 5.7 and the length of hospital stay was 9.0 �
7.3. The most common complications recorded during the acute phase were swallowing disorders (10.2%),
pneumonia (9.1%) and urinary tract infections (8.3%). The in-hospital case fatality was 6.2% and was associated
with loss of consciousness (p ¼ 0.0001), high NIHSS on admission (p ¼ 0.001), fever (p ¼ 0.0001), swallowing
disorders (p ¼ 0.001) and leukocytosis (p ¼ 0.021). On discharge, 27.6% were independent and 97.8% were on
antihypertensive drugs.
Conclusion: The in-hospital stroke mortality was close to that reported by other studies in Africa.