Lactate Dehydrogenase Predicts Early Hematoma Expansion and Poor Outcomes in Intracerebral Hemorrhage Patients.

This study aimed to investigate whether serum lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) levels predicted hematoma expansion and poor outcomes in intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH) patients. The differentially expressed proteins between patients with and without hematoma expansion were screened using proteomic analysis. Then the critical value of the target protein was determined by retrospectively analyzing the data from a derivation cohort. A prospective study on the validation cohort of three clinical centers was performed to investigate the association between the target protein and hematoma expansion and poor outcomes (modified Rankin Scale > 3) at 90 days by using univariate and multivariate logistic regression analyses. Among the 41 differentially expressed proteins, LDH A chain was upregulated, which is one of the two main subunits of LDH protein. Considering that it was easy to determine serum LDH levels, LDH was selected as the target protein. In the derivation cohort, LDH ≥ 220 U/L was selected as the critical value to predict hematoma expansion by using receiver operating characteristic analysis. A total of 366 ICH patients were enrolled in the validation cohort and LDH ≥ 220 U/L was positive in 127 patients (34.7%). The multivariate logistic regression analysis demonstrated LDH levels and LDH ≥ 220 U/L independently predicted hematoma expansion (p < 0.001) and poor outcomes (p < 0.001). The sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, negative predictive value, and accuracy of LDH ≥ 220 U/L for hematoma expansion and poor outcome prediction were 79.1%, 80.0%, 56.7%, 92.1%, and 79.8% and 53.3%, 78.2%, 63.0%, 70.7%, and 68.0%, respectively. In conclusion, LDH is a reliable predictor for early hematoma expansion and poor outcomes in patients with ICH.