Incidence and epidemiology of cerebral venous thrombosis

Cerebral venous sinus thrombosis is a disorder whose epidemiology has changed over the past few decades. It is no longer regarded as a uniformly fatal disease. CVST is not a rare disorder. It may have a differential geographic distribution with a higher incidence in the Asian world. It is a disease of neonates, younger women and men, often a hypercoagulable state, either acquired (eg cancer) or a genetic prothrombotic condition may be present. Outcome is not uniformly dismal and prognostic criteria that detect patients with a poor outcome have become available from prospective studies. There is a paucity of well designed large scale epidemiologic studies focused on venous thrombosis from regions where it is relatively frequent (South Asia, Middle East). The newer epidemiologic data derived from a Caucasian database; suggest a better overall prognosis, younger age at distribution than arterial stroke.