Clinical characteristics and risk factors of Intracranial hemorrhage in patients following allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation.

Intracranial hemorrhage (ICH) is one of the most life-threatening neurological complications after allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. Although cerebral complications and its causes after allo-HSCT are well documented, assessment of the incidence and risk factors of intracranial hemorrhage following allo-HSCT are less discussed. A nested case-control study was conducted involving 160 subjects drawn from 2169 subjects who underwent HSCT at Peking University People's Hospital between 2004 and 2014. Thirty-two patients (1.5 %) with ICH were identified, and 128 controls were matched for age, gender, transplantation type, and time of transplantation. Intracranial hemorrhage was identified by CT scan and/or MRI by searching hospital records. Among the 32 ICH patients, 27 (82.9 %) developed intraparenchymal hemorrhages (IPH), 2 cases (5.7 %) suffered subdural hematomas (SDH), and 3 cases (8.6 %) had multiple hemorrhage lesions in the brain parenchyma. The median time of appearance for cerebral hemorrhages was 147.5 days. Multivariate analysis showed that systemic infections (hazard ratio 2.882, 95 % confidence interval 1.231-6.746), platelet count (5.894, 1.145-30.339), and fibrinogen levels (3.611, 1.528-8.532) were independent risk factors for intracranial hemorrhage among HSCT patients. The cumulative survival rate in the intracranial hemorrhage and control groups were 43.3 and 74.7 % (P = .001), respectively. Intracranial hemorrhage is associated with high mortality and a decreased overall survival rate. Systemic infections, platelet count, and fibrinogen levels were individual independent risk factors.