Acute infarction patterns have been described in cardioembolic stroke, mainly with atrial fibrillation (AF) or patent foramen ovale. We aimed to analyse acute infarction MRI characteristics in stroke patients with intracardiac thrombus (ICT) compared with stroke patients with AF.

Inclusion Criteria:

• consecutive patients presenting with acute symptomatic cardioembolic infarction associated with ICT, recruited and registered in the stroke database between June 2018 and November 2019 of our centre (Nîmes University Hospital, France). These patients were compared with consecutive cardioembolic stroke patients with known or newly discovered AF (in the absence of ICT on echocardiography), recruited during the same time period.
• Brain MRI (including diffusion-weighted imaging [DWI]) performed within one week of symptom onset; complete etiological work-up including intracranial (time-of-flight [TOF], gadolinium-enhanced magnetic resonance angiography [MRA], or computed tomographic angiography [CTA]) and extracranial (gadolinium-enhanced MRA, CTA, or duplex ultrasound) vessel imaging; transthoracic or transoesophageal echocardiography; and ≥24h ECG monitoring (acute stroke unit monitoring and/or Holter ECG monitoring).

Exclusion Criteria:

• opt-out patient

2 groups of patients :

1 - Stroke patients with atrial fibrillation

2- Stroke patients with intracardiac thrombus