Background and Purpose—Most patients with cerebral sinus thrombosis (CST) recover after treatment with heparin, but a subgroup has a poor prognosis. Those patients may benefit from endovascular thrombolysis.

Methods—Prospective case series. Patients with sinus thrombosis were selected for thrombolysis if they had an altered mental status, coma, straight sinus thrombosis, or large space-occupying lesions. Urokinase was infused into the sinuses (bolus 120 to 600x10³ U; then 100x10³ U/h) via a jugular catheter, in 15 cases combined with mechanical thrombus disruption or removal.

Results—We treated 20 patients (16 women), mean age 32 years. Twelve patients were comatose and 14 had hemorrhagic infarcts before thrombolysis. Twelve patients recovered (Rankin score 0 to 2), 2 survived with handicaps, and 6 died. Factors associated with a fatal outcome were leukemia (3/6 versus 0/14, P=0.02) and large hemorrhagic infarcts (4/6 versus 2/14, P=0.04). Seizures were less frequent in the fatal cases (P=0.05). Patients who died had a larger mean lesion surface than survivors (30.5 versus 13.6 cm²; P=0.03), larger midline shift (5.2 versus 1.7 mm; P=0.02), and a more rapid course (2.7 versus 8.2 days; P=0.01). Five patients who died had large hemispheric infarcts and edema before thrombolysis, causing herniation. Five patients had increased cerebral hemorrhage (3 minor, 2 major) after thrombolysis.

Conclusions—Thrombolysis can be effective for severe sinus thrombosis, but patients may deteriorate because of increased cerebral hemorrhage. Patients with large infarcts and impending herniation did not benefit.