Isoelectric focusing of cerebrospinal fluid proteins in ischemic cerebrovascular disease.

The cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) protein patterns, in ischemic cerebrovascular disease (ICD), of varying extension were studied by isoelectric focusing (IEF) in 100 patients at different intervals after the onset of symptoms. The diagnoses were based on conventional clinical examinations and CSF spectrophotometry in all cases. Computed tomography was performed on 52 cases. One or more CSF protein aberrations were noted in 94 patients. Some of these findings were most common with small lesions including TIA. Other aberrations were most frequent with the more extensive infarctions. A regional increase in the gammaglobulin range was found in six cases. The findings were most frequent in the first days after the stroke except for barrier damage which reached a maximum during the second week. The IEF findings of CSF seem to be of diagnostic value. Taken together with the clinical signs and CT findings, they could conceivably give prognostic information.