Brief Reports Association Between Mycoplasma Pneumonia and Increased Risk of Ischemic Stroke A Nationwide Study

Background and Purpose—Infections have been hypothesized to play a role in vascular disease. The association between Mycoplasma pneumoniae (MP) infection and ischemic stroke remained undetermined. Methods—A total of 1094 patients with MP infection were enrolled as the study group and compared with 5168 sex-, age-, and comorbidity-matched subjects without MP, to be followed up prospectively from January 2003 to December 2007 for development of ischemic stroke. Results—During a maximum 5-year follow-up period, 49 patients with ischemic stroke were identified. Subjects with MP infection were significantly associated with increased risk of ischemic stroke compared with controls (1.10% versus 0.72%, respectively; P 0.01). The logrank test showed that patients with MP had significantly higher incidence of stroke development than did those without MP (P 0.046). After Cox model adjustment for risk factors and comorbidities, MP infection was still independently associated with increased risk of stroke (hazard ratio [HR], 2.07; 95% CI, 1.05–4.03). Conclusions—We conclude that MP infection is independently associated with risk of subsequent ischemic stroke development. (Stroke. 2011;42:2940-2943.)