Published Online
on April 7, 2005

A more recent version of this article appeared on May 1, 2005

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Submitted on December 21, 2004
Accepted on February 15, 2005

A Digital Map of Middle Cerebral Artery Infarcts Associated With Middle Cerebral Artery Trunk and Branch Occlusion

Thanh G. Phan FRACP; Geoffrey A. Donnan MD, FRACP; Peter M. Wright FRACP; and David C. Reutens MD, FRACP^*

From the Neuroimaging Division (T.G.P., G.A.D., P.M.W., D.C.R.), National Stroke Research Institute and The University of Melbourne, Austin & Repatriation Medical Centre, Melbourne, Australia; Monash Institute of Neurological Diseases (D.C.R.), Monash Medical Centre, Melbourne, Australia.

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: david.reutens{at}med.monash.edu.au.

Abstract--Knowledge of the topographic distribution of infarcts of the middle cerebral artery (MCA) may give insight into the limits of the arterial territory and infarct mechanism and may influence the decision to use thrombolytic therapy. We describe the creation of a digital atlas of MCA (DA-MCA) infarction associated with MCA branch and trunk occlusion using magnetic resonance (MR) techniques. Hemispheric infarcts, with evidence of MCA trunk or branch occlusion, were manually segmented into binary images, linearly registered into a common stereotaxic coordinate space, and averaged to yield the probability of involvement by infarction at each voxel. Comparisons were made with existing maps of the MCA territory. Twenty-eight patients with median age of 74 years (range, 26 to 87 years) were studied. On the DA-MCA, the highest frequency of infarction was within the striatocapsular region, centrum semiovale, and the insula. The mean and maximal MCA infarct volumes were 195.5 cm³ and 366.3 cm³, respectively. Comparison with published maps showed that the most common difference from the DA-MCA was in the superomedial extent of the MCA territory. Some maps showed the MCA territory reaching the interhemispheric fissure, whereas in the DA-MCA it did not. There was a lower variability in the anterior boundary of the MCA territory compared with its posterior counterpart. We have created a digital atlas of MCA infarction using MR imaging techniques. This approach may be useful to establish the distribution of the MCA and other arterial territories and the border zones between them with greater certainty.

Key words: magnetic resonance imaging • middle cerebral artery • stroke

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