Diagnosing Cerebral Amyloid Angiopathy

MRI and Cerebral Amyloid Angiopathy

This is an MRI of a brain showing Cerebral Amyloid Angiopathy

While my husband was in the Stroke Unit they were able to compare his MRI results to those taken two years earlier. It showed a substantial increase in the number of microbleeds throughout his brain in the last two years, all of which had been apparently asymptomatic.

Of course this raises the question of how can you have a stroke and not know about it? In CAA it is common for microbleeds to occur without the person or their loved ones being aware of it. It's only when you do an MRI that you can see them. They generally don't show up in a regular CT scan. The image above shows a typical MRI of a person with CAA.

So what is your approach and that of your medical practitioners into the future? Given that there is no known cause, no treatment and no cure, do you really want to have 6 monthly or annual scans to prove the deterioration of the condition? What purpose does that serve? We decided, in conjunction with his specialist, that there was little value in doing this. Why do you need to be shown evidence regularly of the deterioration in your condition when nothing can be done (apart from keeping your blood pressure at a good level). You actually may not feel that there has been any deterioration, so under the circumstances why do you need to know, particularly when there is no predictive value in what the MRI shows.

This has certainly worked for us but everyone needs to work out what is best for their own circumstances. 

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