Mixed cerebrovascular disease in an elderly patient with mixed vascular risk factors: a case report

BACKGROUND: Mixed cerebrovascular disease is a diagnostic entity that presents with hemorrhagic and ischemic stroke clinically and/or subclinically. Here, we report a patient with mixed vascular risk factors, who presented with multiple intracerebral hemorrhages and a simultaneously occurring cerebral infarction with hemorrhagic transformation. CASE PRESENTATION: A 63-year-old male with no history of trauma or prior neurological disease presented with a sudden onset of weakness in his right limbs, followed by an episode of focal seizure without impaired awareness. The patient had a 4-year history of deep vein thrombosis in the lower limbs, and a 2-year history of Raynaud’s phenomenon in the hands. He also had a family history of hypertension and thrombophilia. Head computed tomography plain scans showed two high densities in the bilateral parietal lobes and one mixed density in the left frontal lobe. The patient was diagnosed with mixed cerebrovascular disease. In this report, we make a systematic clinical reasoning regarding the etiological diagnosis, and discuss the possible pathogenic mechanisms leading to mixed cerebrovascular disease. We exclude coagulopathy, endocarditis, atrial fibrillation, patent foramen ovale, brain tumor, cerebral venous thrombosis, cerebral vascular malformation, cerebral amyloid angiopathy and vasculitis as causative factors. We identify hypertension, hereditary protein S deficiency, hypercholesteremia and hyperhomocysteinemia as contributing etiologies in this case. CONCLUSION: This case presents complex underlying mechanisms of mixed cerebrovascular disease, in which hypertension and hyperhomocysteinemia are considered to play a central role.