Identification of the type of stroke upon presentation at the emergency room is paramount. The initiation of prompt treatment may pay dividends in the eventual outcome of strokes. This is a retrospective study. The aim of this paper is to determine if there is a correlation berween an elevared blood pressure and rhe occurrence of either an ischemic infarcr or a hemorrhagic infarct. It aims to determine if a systolic blood pressure of >160 mm Hg or a diastolic blood pressme of >110 mmHg may be correlated to an incidence of hemorrhagic strokes.

A series of 273 consecutive patients hospitalized in our institution berween January 2006 and December 2006 with a diagnosis of stroke were reviewed from the stroke database of our institution. Analysis was carried out using the SPSS software package (version 10.0.1; SPSS Inc., Chicago, Illinois, USA).

There was no correlation among the key variables: a) none berween type of stroke and presence of severe systolic HTN, p > .05 (exact value = .075), b) none berween rype of stroke and presence of severe diastolic HTN, p > .05 (exact value= .240), and c) none between type of stroke and age (young-middle versus older), p > .05 (exact value= .088).

The study was not able to establish a correlation between elevated hypertension and stroke type. There was no significant correlation between either systolic hypertension or diastolic hypertension in the occurrence of intracerebral hemorrhage.