How appropriate is use of antiplatelet medications in patients with transient ischemic attacks and stroke: an analysis of 9132 patients over eight years

Background and purpose Guidelines recommend patients with high-risk TIAs and minor stroke presenting within 1-3 days from onset be offered dual antiplatelet therapy (DAPT). There is little data on real-world adherence to these recommendations. We evaluated the appropriateness of DAPT use in TIA and stroke patients in a prospective Database. Methods The Qatar Stroke Database began enrollment of patients with TIAs and acute stroke in 2014 and currently has ∼ 16,000 patients. For this study we evaluated the rates of guideline-adherent use of antiplatelet treatment at the time of discharge in patients with TIAs and stroke. TIAs were considered high-risk with ABCD2 score of ⍰ 4 and minor stroke was defined as NIHSS ⍰ 3. Patient demographics, clinical features, risk factors, previous medications, imaging and laboratory investigations, final diagnosis, discharge medications, and discharge and 90-day modified Rankin Scale (mRS) were analyzed. Results After excluding patients with ICH, mimics and rare secondary causes, 8082 patients available for final analysis (TIAs: 1357;stroke 6725). In high-risk TIAs, 282 of 666 (42.3%) patients were discharged on DAPT. In patients with minor stroke, 1207 of 3572 (33.8%) patients were discharged on DAPT. DAPT was inappropriately offered to 238 of 691 (34.4%) of low-risk TIAs and 809 of 3153 (25.7%) of non-minor stroke patients. Conclusions This large database of prospectively collected patients with TIAs and stroke shows that, unfortunately, despite several guidelines, a large majority of patients with TIAs and stroke are receiving inappropriate antiplatelet treatment at discharge from hospital. This requires urgent attention and further investigation. ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest. ### Clinical Trial - ### Clinical Protocols - - ### Funding Statement None ### Author Declarations I confirm all relevant ethical guidelines have been followed, and any necessary IRB and/or ethics committee approvals have been obtained. Not Applicable The details of the IRB/oversight body that provided approval or exemption for the research described are given below: The study was approved by the Institutional Review Board, Hamad Medical Corporation at the Medical Research Centre (MRC-01-20-1135) and the Institutional Review Board of Weill Cornell Medicine- Qatar (1932095-1/22-00016) I confirm that all necessary patient/participant consent has been obtained and the appropriate institutional forms have been archived, and that any patient/participant/sample identifiers included were not known to anyone (e.g., hospital staff, patients or participants themselves) outside the research group so cannot be used to identify individuals. Not Applicable I understand that all clinical trials and any other prospective interventional studies must be registered with an ICMJE-approved registry, such as ClinicalTrials.gov. I confirm that any such study reported in the manuscript has been registered and the trial registration ID is provided (note: if posting a prospective study registered retrospectively, please provide a statement in the trial ID field explaining why the study was not registered in advance). Not Applicable I have followed all appropriate research reporting guidelines and uploaded the relevant EQUATOR Network research reporting checklist(s) and other pertinent material as supplementary files, if applicable. Not Applicable All data are available in the document. No additional data available