Abstract
There is very little known about cerebrovascular disease and high altitude. Thus, we want to share our experience as a certified primary stroke care center in Colombia in a short period and become a reference for comparison of hospitals located at different altitudes, thus contributing and promoting from our experience, practical guidelines for the care of these population groups, since there is no association established by the current literature.
We are a university hospital located in Bogota, Colombia, at an average altitude of ∼2,600 m and some areas located at >3,100 m, classified as high-altitude demographic zones (Pollard and Murdoch, 2003). Our care center for patients with stroke was inaugurated in 2009 (Bayona et al, 2014), formed by a multidisciplinary group in the “Hospital Universitario Fundación Santa Fe de Bogotá” cataloged as a high complexity center with international certifications (Joint Commission) for stroke care, being the first hospital in Colombia to adopt RapidAI® technology as support tools in stroke decision-making (iSchemaView, n.d.). It is important to clarify that the approach to our patients follows the institutional protocol that is based on the guidelines proposed by the American Heart Association and the American Stroke Association.
From 2018 to the elapsed of the current year, we have attended a total of 1,871 cases of stroke; 642 have been ischemic strokes, 81 hemorrhagic strokes, and 150 correspond to transient ischemic attack, the other cases are part of a group of patients with comparable symptoms of a stroke. Also, in our center, the mean age of 71 years has been observed, with a female predominance gender. According to the Territorial Information System on Stroke (SITAC), a platform created by the University of Los Andes and sponsored by the Administrative Department of Science, Technology, and Innovation (Colciencias) reports 14,266 cases of stroke in Bogota during the period 2011–2015, making it the most affected city with a higher incidence in women (Pérez, n.d.).
It is noteworthy that the highest incidence of stroke cases in Colombia is reported in Bogotá, a finding that could be associated with population density, easy access to high complexity medical care centers, and adequate reporting of cases. Although the association of stroke is not clear with different altitude levels, in our population this could be considered a risk factor, since we have a higher incidence of these cases in the female population in contrast to the world reports (Vyas et al, 2021), a finding that could generate new research hypotheses. Therefore, we want to serve as a comparative center and promote new multicenter and multidisciplinary studies to determine whether or not there is an association between stroke and altitude.
Footnotes
Author Disclosure Statement
No competing financial interests exist.