[Infarcts in the brain areas supplied by the posterior cerebral artery. Clinical aspects, pathogenesis and prognosis].

The clinical and neuroradiological features of 127 patients with ischemia of the posterior cerebral artery (PCA) and a positive CT scan (n = 122) or pathological angiography findings (n = 63) were analyzed. Unilateral headache was the most common presenting symptom (50%), making complicated migraine an important differential diagnosis. Clinical findings were visual field deficits (93%), sensory (29%), motor (28%), and neuropsychological deficits (25%). Infarcts, including the thalamus (n = 27), were mostly associated with sensory and slight motor deficits. Our findings suggest that motor deficits in PCA ischemia, particularly if minor and reversible, are likely to be due to ischemia-induced edema in the internal capsule adjacent to an associated thalamic infarct. Based on angiography, stroke etiology was considered embolic in 83/127 (65%), atherothrombotic in 20/126 (16%), and probably migrainous in 4 (3%) patients. In the remaining 20 patients (16%), the etiology was uncertain. Prognosis of PCA infarcts is usually good.