Evaluation of the role of ischemia modified albumin as a new biochemical marker for differentiation between ischemic and hemorrhagic stroke

Objective: To evaluate the role of the detection of ischemia modified albumin (IMA) level in the differentiation between ischemic and hemorrhagic cerebrovascular stroke. Methods: Sixty elderly persons classified into three groups, 25 patients diagnosed with cerebral infarction, 15 patients diagnosed with cerebral hemorrhage, and 20 elderly healthy persons with matched age as control were enrolled in the study. IMA was measured using the available chemical method and computerized tomography (CT) was done for diagnosis of brain lesions. Results: IMA was significantly higher in the patient group than in the control group. There was a positive significant correlation between age, albumin with IMA, (P =0.000 and 0.037 respectively). However there was no statistical significant difference between sex and diagnosis cross tabulation (0.51). It was found that, IMA was statistically higher in the infarction group than the hemorrhage group (P = 0.000) and IMD index was statistically higher in the infarction group than the hemorrhage group (P = 0.013). Conclusion: Our investigation in elderly patients suggests that IMA assay is a sensitive marker for early detection of ischemic and hemorrhagic stroke.