Intracranial pressure monitoring for malignant stroke: It is too soon to call it off.

Abstract

Malignant cerebral infarction (MCI) is a large middle cerebral artery infarction. MCI frequently results in increased intracranial pressure (ICP) because of its extent of the infarction. MCI management focuses on lowering ICP, but monitoring ICP has not been a standard of care. Studies have found insignificant clinical value in monitoring ICP because of doubtful correlations between ICP values and clinical findings. However, this conclusion is largely based on unilateral ICP measurements. Bilateral ICP measurements and differentials accompanying clinical findings are needed to draw a concrete conclusion on the usage of ICP monitoring in MCI management.