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A BS T R AC T
T
ransient ischemic attack (TIA) and try were performed by staff at the Tiantan Clinical
acute minor ischemic stroke are common Trial and Research Center for Stroke, where the
and often lead to disabling events. In Chi- data analysis was performed. One of the authors
na, there are approximately 3 million new strokes had full access to an independent database for
every year, and approximately 30% of them are any questions regarding the analyses. All mem-
minor ischemic strokes.1,2 The incidence of TIA bers of the writing committee contributed to and
in China has not been determined, but on the approved an earlier draft of this manuscript,
basis of the incidence in other countries, there which was prepared without professional edito-
are probably more than 2 million TIAs annually rial assistance. The first and last authors made
in China.3-5 The risk of another stroke occurring the decision to submit the manuscript for publi-
after a TIA or minor stroke is high, with approx- cation. All the authors assume responsibility for
imately 10 to 20% of patients having a stroke the accuracy and completeness of the data and
within 3 months after the index event; most of the fidelity of this report to the study protocol.
these strokes occur within the first 2 days.5-8 There was no confidentiality agreement between
The role of antiplatelet therapy for secondary the study sponsor (the Ministry of Science and
stroke prevention has been well established. How- Technology of the Peoples Republic of China)
ever, aspirin is the only antiplatelet agent that and the investigators. There was no commercial
has been studied in the acute phase of stroke, support for this study.
during which its benefit is modest.9,10 Aspirin All the participants or their legal proxies pro-
and clopidogrel synergistically inhibit platelet ag- vided written informed consent. The CHANCE
gregation,11,12 and such dual therapy reduces the protocol was approved by the ethics committee
risk of recurrent ischemic events in patients with at each study center. Clopidogrel and the match-
the acute coronary syndrome.13,14 Large-scale trials ing placebo were purchased from Sanofi-Aventis,
of secondary prevention of ischemic events after which had no other role in the study.
stroke have not shown a benefit of the combina-
tion of clopidogrel and aspirin.15-17 However, these STUDY POPULATION
trials did not study the early, high-risk period af- Patients who met the following inclusion criteria
ter stroke, they included some patients with were eligible: age of 40 years or older; diagnosis
strokes of moderate severity, and they included of an acute minor ischemic stroke or TIA; and
few if any patients with TIA. Three small pilot ability to start the study drug within 24 hours
trials have shown trends toward a benefit of the after symptom onset, which was defined as the
combination therapy and minimal safety concerns point at which the patient reported no longer be-
in patients with minor stroke or TIA.18-20 ing in a normal condition. Acute minor stroke
We conducted the Clopidogrel in High-Risk was defined by a score of 3 or less at the time of
Patients with Acute Nondisabling Cerebrovascu- randomization on the National Institutes of Health
lar Events (CHANCE) trial to test the hypothesis Stroke Scale (NIHSS; scores range from 0 to 42,
that 3 months of treatment with a combination with higher scores indicating greater deficits).
of clopidogrel and aspirin would reduce the risk of TIA was defined as focal brain ischemia with res-
recurrent stroke, as compared with aspirin alone, olution of symptoms within 24 hours after onset
among patients with acute high-risk TIA or minor plus a moderate-to-high risk of stroke recurrence
ischemic stroke. (defined as a score of 4 at the time of randomiza-
tion on the ABCD,2 which assesses the risk of
ME THODS stroke on the basis of age, blood pressure, clinical
features, duration of TIA, and presence or absence
STUDY OVERSIGHT of diabetes; scores range from 0 to 7, with higher
We conducted this study according to the proto- scores indicating greater short-term risk).
col and statistical analysis plan, which are avail- All patients with possible clinical neurologic
able with the full text of this article at NEJM.org. events during the follow-up period underwent
The trial was designed by three of the authors and computed tomography (CT) or magnetic resonance
was overseen by the executive committee, which imaging (MRI) of the head. Patients were excluded
had full access to the data. Data collection and en- if they had any of the following: hemorrhage;
other conditions, such as vascular malformation, a number corresponding to a medication kit stored
tumor, abscess, or other major nonischemic brain at the study site, and the medication in the kit
disease; isolated sensory symptoms (e.g., numb- was administered to the patient.
ness), isolated visual changes, or isolated dizzi- Both groups received open-label aspirin on
ness or vertigo without evidence of acute infarc- day 1 (with the dose ranging from 75 to 300 mg,
tion on baseline CT or MRI of the head; a score at the discretion of the treating physician). Patients
of more than 2 on the modified Rankin scale randomly assigned to the clopidogrelaspirin
(scores range from 0 [no symptoms] to 6 [death]) group received a loading dose of 300 mg of clopid
immediately before the occurrence of the index ogrel on day 1, followed by a dose of 75 mg per
ischemic stroke or TIA, indicating moderate dis- day on days 2 through 90, aspirin at a dose of 75
ability or worse at baseline; an NIHSS score of mg per day on days 2 through 21, and placebo
4 or more at randomization; a clear indication aspirin on days 22 through 90. Patients randomly
for anticoagulation therapy (presumed cardiac assigned to the aspirin group received a placebo
source of embolus, such as atrial fibrillation or version of clopidogrel on days 1 through 90 and
prosthetic cardiac valve) or a contraindication to aspirin at a dose of 75 mg per day on days 2
clopidogrel or aspirin; history of intracranial hem- through 90. Randomization was stratified ac-
orrhage; anticipated requirement for long-term cording to clinical center and interval between
nonstudy antiplatelet drugs or for nonsteroidal symptom onset and enrollment (<12 hours vs.
antiinflammatory drugs affecting platelet func- 12 to 24 hours). The primary objective was to
tion; heparin therapy or oral anticoagulation ther- assess the effects of the two treatment regimens
apy within 10 days before randomization; gas- on the incidence of stroke in the first 90 days after
trointestinal bleeding or major surgery within acute minor stroke or high-risk TIA.
the previous 3 months; planned or probable revas-
cularization (any angioplasty or vascular surgery) STUDY OUTCOMES
within 3 months after screening (if clinically The primary efficacy outcome was a new stroke
indicated, vascular imaging was to be performed event (ischemic or hemorrhagic) at 90 days. Ische
before randomization, whenever possible); planned mic stroke was defined as an acute focal infarc-
surgery or interventional treatment requiring tion of the brain or retina with one of the follow-
cessation of the study drug; TIA or minor stroke ing: sudden onset of a new focal neurologic deficit,
caused by angiography or surgery; or severe non- with clinical or imaging evidence of infarction
cardiovascular coexisting condition, with a life lasting 24 hours or more and not attributable to
expectancy of less than 3 months. Women of a nonischemic cause (i.e., not associated with brain
childbearing age who were not practicing reliable infection, trauma, tumor, seizure, severe meta-
contraception and did not have a documented bolic disease, or degenerative neurologic disease);
negative pregnancy test and patients receiving a new focal neurologic deficit lasting for less than
other investigational drugs or devices were also 24 hours and not attributable to a nonischemic
excluded (see Table S1 in the Supplementary Ap- cause but accompanied by neuroimaging evidence
pendix, available at NEJM.org). No patients in- of new brain infarction; or rapid worsening of an
cluded in the study were treated with throm- existing focal neurologic deficit lasting more than
bolysis around the time of randomization. 24 hours and not attributable to a nonischemic
cause, accompanied by new ischemic changes on
STUDY DESIGN MRI or CT of the brain and clearly distinct from
CHANCE was a randomized, double-blind, pla- the index ischemic event. Hemorrhagic stroke was
cebo-controlled clinical trial conducted at 114 defined as acute extravasation of blood into the
clinical centers in China; details of the rationale brain parenchyma or subarachnoid space with as-
for the study and its design have been published sociated neurologic symptoms. Recurrent stroke
previously.21 Patients meeting the enrollment cri- was considered to be disabling if the score on the
teria were randomly assigned to one of the two modified Rankin scale was 2 or more.
treatment groups with the use of a double-blind, The primary safety outcome was a moderate-
double-dummy design. The site investigator called to-severe bleeding event, according to the Global
into an automated system that randomly assigned Utilization of Streptokinase and Tissue Plasmino-
gen Activator for Occluded Coronary Arteries day follow-up period were assessed with the use
(GUSTO) definition.22 Severe hemorrhage was of a Cox proportional-hazards model, with pooled
defined as fatal or intracranial hemorrhage or study centers (20 patients) as a random effect.
other hemorrhage causing hemodynamic com- Hazard ratios with 95% confidence intervals
promise that required blood or fluid replace- are reported. When there were multiple events of
ment, inotropic support, or surgical intervention. the same type, the time to the first event was
Moderate hemorrhage was defined as bleeding used in the model. Data from patients who had
that required transfusion of blood but did not no events during the study were censored at the
lead to hemodynamic compromise requiring in- time of study termination or death. We used this
tervention.22 approach to maximize the time-dependent infor-
Key secondary efficacy outcomes included a mation in the trial while maintaining the ease of
new clinical vascular event (ischemic stroke, hem- interpretation of risks. For each model, the
orrhagic stroke, myocardial infarction, or vascu- proportional-hazards assumption was assessed
lar death), analyzed as a composite outcome and by testing the interaction between treatment and
also as individual outcomes. Vascular death was time. In addition, we assessed whether the treat-
defined as death due to stroke (ischemic or hem- ment effect differed in certain prespecified sub-
orrhagic), systemic hemorrhage, myocardial in- groups by testing the treatment-by-subgroup in-
farction, congestive heart failure, pulmonary em- teraction effect with the use of Cox models. All
bolism, sudden death, or arrhythmia. Efficacy tests were two-sided, and a P value of 0.05 was
outcomes were also analyzed according to pre- considered to indicate statistical significance.
specified subgroups. All statistical analyses were performed with the
All reported efficacy and safety outcomes were use of SAS software, version 9.0 (SAS Institute).
confirmed by a central adjudication committee
that was unaware of the study-group assignments. R E SULT S
The committee members classified ischemic-
stroke subtypes on the basis of available diagnos- STUDY PATIENTS AND FOLLOW-UP
tic studies. A data and safety monitoring board Between October 2009 and July 2012, a total of
whose members were selected by the sponsor was 41,561 patients with stroke or TIA were screened at
in place to ensure the safety of patients during 114 clinical sites; 5170 patients were enrolled, with
the study, with predetermined periodic assess- 2584 randomly assigned to the clopidogrelaspi-
ments of safety and stopping rules. rin group and 2586 to the aspirin group. The most
common reasons for exclusion were delayed pre-
STATISTICAL ANALYSIS sentation (26.4% of screened patients); moderate
We calculated that a sample of 5100 patients or severe stroke (10.4%); intracranial hemorrhage
would provide 90% power to detect a relative risk (7.0%); low-risk TIA, defined as a score of <4 on
reduction of 22% in the clopidogrelaspirin group, the ABCD2 (6.5%); or contraindication to clopido-
with a two-sided type I error of 0.05, assuming grel or aspirin (6.0%) (Fig. S3 in the Supplemen-
an event rate of 14% in the aspirin group and a tary Appendix). The two groups were well bal-
5% overall rate of withdrawal (defined as medica- anced regarding baseline characteristics (Table 1).
tion nonadherence).21 The median age was 62 years, and 33.8% of
No patient withdrew between the time of the patients were women. A total of 65.7% of the
randomization and the administration of the patients had a history of hypertension, 21.1%
first dose of study medication; all analyses were had diabetes, and 43.0% were current or former
based on the population of patients who under- smokers. The median time from the onset of the
went randomization. We compared the baseline qualifying minor stroke or TIA to randomiza-
characteristics of the patients in the two study tion was 13 hours. The index event was a TIA in
groups. Proportions were used for categorical 1445 patients (27.9%). A total of 36 patients
variables, and medians with interquartile ranges (0.7%) 20 in the clopidogrelaspirin group
were used for continuous variables. Time to ran- and 16 in the aspirin group were lost to fol-
domization was calculated as a group mean. Dif- low-up; 165 patients (6.4%) in the clopidogrel
ferences between study groups in the rate of aspirin group and 146 (5.6%) in the aspirin
stroke (ischemic or hemorrhagic) during the 90- group discontinued the study medication before
KEY SECONDARY AND OTHER EFFICACY OUTCOMES Medical history no. (%)
The composite outcome of vascular events oc- Ischemic stroke 517 (20.0) 516 (20.0)
curred in 216 patients (8.4%) in the clopidogrel TIA 80 (3.1) 94 (3.6)
aspirin group, as compared with 307 patients Myocardial infarction 53 (2.0) 43 (1.7)
(11.9%) in the aspirin group (hazard ratio, 0.69; Angina 87 (3.4) 97 (3.8)
95% CI, 0.58 to 0.82; P<0.001) (Table 2, and Fig. Congestive heart failure 38 (1.5) 42 (1.6)
S4 in the Supplementary Appendix). Death from Known atrial fibrillation or flutter 48 (1.9) 48 (1.9)
any cause occurred in 0.4% of the patients in Valvular heart disease 10 (0.4) 4 (0.2)
each group. Vascular death (including death Hypertension 1683 (65.1) 1716 (66.4)
from hemorrhagic stroke) occurred in 6 patients Diabetes mellitus 543 (21.0) 550 (21.3)
(0.2%) in the clopidogrelaspirin group and in 5 Hypercholesterolemia 283 (10.9) 290 (11.2)
(0.2%) in the aspirin group. TIA occurred in 39 Pulmonary embolism 1 (<0.1) 0
patients (1.5%) in the clopidogrelaspirin group
Current or previous smoking no. (%) 1105 (42.7) 1116 (43.2)
and in 47 (1.8%) in the aspirin group (P=0.36).
Mean time to randomization hr 13 13
SUBGROUPS * There were no significant differences between the treatment groups for any
The reduction in the rate of stroke and combined characteristic. Additional baseline characteristics are reported in Table S2 in
the Supplementary Appendix. TIA denotes transient ischemic attack.
secondary vascular events with clopidogrel and The body-mass index is the weight in kilograms divided by the square of the
aspirin was consistent across all major subgroups height in meters.
(Fig. 2, and Fig. S5 in the Supplementary Appen- Data are only for the 1445 patients who had a TIA. The ABCD2 assesses the
risk of stroke on the basis of age, blood pressure, clinical features, duration of
dix). There were no significant interactions in TIA, and presence or absence of diabetes, with scores ranging from 0 to 7 and
any of the 11 predefined subgroups (P>0.10 for higher scores indicating greater short-term risk.
all comparisons).
* Bleeding events were defined according to the Global Utilization of Streptokinase and Tissue Plasminogen Activator for
Occluded Coronary Arteries criteria as follows: severe bleeding was defined as fatal or intracranial hemorrhage or other
hemorrhage causing hemodynamic compromise that required blood or fluid replacement, inotropic support, or surgi-
cal intervention; moderate bleeding as bleeding that required transfusion of blood but did not lead to hemodynamic
compromise requiring intervention; and mild bleeding as bleeding not requiring transfusion and not causing hemody-
namic compromise (e.g., subcutaneous bleeding, mild hematomas, and oozing from puncture sites).22
No. of Clopidogrel
Subgroup Patients Aspirin Aspirin Hazard Ratio (95% CI) P Value
no. of events (%)
Overall 5170 303 (11.7) 212 (8.2) 0.68 (0.570.81)
Age 0.84
<65 yr 3029 164 (10.7) 110 (7.4) 0.67 (0.520.85)
65 yr 2141 139 (13.2) 102 (9.4) 0.70 (0.540.90)
Sex 0.37
Male 3420 190 (11.3) 130 (7.5) 0.65 (0.520.81)
Female 1750 113 (12.6) 82 (9.6) 0.79 (0.591.05)
Index event 0.91
Minor stroke 3725 223 (12.0) 159 (8.5) 0.69 (0.560.84)
TIA 1445 80 (11.0) 53 (7.4) 0.65 (0.450.93)
ABCD2 score 0.47
4 747 33 (8.8) 27 (7.3) 0.69 (0.401.19)
>4 698 47 (13.4) 26 (7.5) 0.60 (0.361.00)
Previous stroke 0.49
Yes 1033 54 (10.4) 42 (8.1) 0.80 (0.521.21)
No 4137 249 (12.0) 170 (8.2) 0.66 (0.550.81)
Previous TIA 0.34
Yes 174 13 (16.2) 7 (7.4) 0.47 (0.151.44)
No 4996 290 (11.6) 205 (8.2) 0.69 (0.580.83)
History of hypertension 0.69
Yes 3399 220 (13.1) 158 (9.2) 0.70 (0.570.85)
No 1771 83 (9.2) 54 (6.2) 0.63 (0.440.89)
Previous diabetes 0.69
Yes 1093 74 (13.6) 56 (10.2) 0.75 (0.521.07)
No 4077 229 (11.2) 156 (7.7) 0.67 (0.540.82)
Systolic pressure 0.25
140 mm Hg 3790 250 (13.2) 165 (8.7) 0.65 (0.530.79)
<140 mm Hg 1376 53 (7.6) 46 (6.7) 0.84 (0.561.26)
Time to randomization 0.36
<12 hr 2573 162 (12.7) 125 (9.7) 0.73 (0.580.93)
12 hr 2597 141 (10.8) 87 (6.7) 0.62 (0.470.81)
Aspirin taken within 24 hr 0.91
Yes 597 38 (12.3) 26 (9.0) 0.66 (0.471.11)
No 4573 265 (11.6) 186 (8.1) 0.68 (0.560.82)
0.1 0.3 0.5 1.0 2.0
In conclusion, our study shows that among pirin did not cause more hemorrhagic events in
patients with high-risk TIA or minor ischemic this patient population than aspirin alone.
stroke who are initially seen within 24 hours Supported by grants (2008ZX09312-008, 2011BAI08B02,
after symptom onset, treatment with clopidogrel 2012ZX09303, and 200902004) from the Ministry of Science and
plus aspirin for 21 days, followed by clopidogrel Technology of the Peoples Republic of China.
No potential conflict of interest relevant to this article was
alone for a total of 90 days, is superior to aspirin reported.
alone in reducing the risk of subsequent stroke Disclosure forms provided by the authors are available with
events. The combination of clopidogrel with as- the full text of this article at NEJM.org
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