Update on the ASPECT Hydrocephalus System

Of the many hydrocephalus classification systems the International Classification of Diseases (ICD) is widely used, but in ICD-10 and the upcoming ICD-11, hydrocephalus diagnoses incorporate only a few factors, and the hydrocephalus diagnoses of the ICD systems are based on different clinical measures. As a consequence, multiple diagnoses can be applied to individual cases. Therefore, similar patients may be described with different diagnoses, while clinically different patients may be diagnosed identically. This causes unnecessary dispersion in hydrocephalus diagnostics, rendering the ICD classification of little use for research and clinical decision-making.

The “ASPECT hydrocephalus system” presents a new descriptive system consisting of six clinical key factors of hydrocephalus: A (anatomy); S (symptomatology); P (previous interventions); E (etiology); C (complications); T (time–onset and current age).

The “ASPECT hydrocephalus system” is a systematic, nuanced, and applicable description of patients with hydrocephalus, with a potential to resolve the major issues of previous classifications, thus providing new opportunities for standardized treatment and research.

Latest update

In a collaboration with members from the EANS CSF and Pediatric Neurosurgery sections, we have published a paper introducing the “ASPECT hydrocephalus system” and have submitted a study demonstrating the clinical applicability of the ASPECT hydrocephalus System on 250 patients while further investigating the systems utility.

Currently, medicine students at the neurosurgical department at Rigshospitalet are registering hydrocephalus patients using ASPECT coding thereby allowing a future routine clinical use.

The system is being evaluated by members of the European Association of Neursurgical societies in an ongoing survey.