Abstract: Objective To evaluate the injury of optic radiation after ischemic stroke with diffusion tensor imaging (DTI). Methods From September, 2014 to September, 2015, twenty-one ischemic stroke inpatients with visual field defects were tested with DTI, and measured the fractional anisotropy (FA) and apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) of both sides in different time. The correlation of FA and ADC to visual field mean defect (MD) in the same time was analyzed. Results The FA of affected sides was lower than that of healthy sides twenty-four hours (t=2.38, P<0.05), one week (t=15.60, P<0.01) and four weeks (t=19.13, P<0.01) after stroke, and the ADC was also lower twenty-four hours (t=10.13, P<0.01) and one week (t=6.06, P<0.01) after stroke. The FA correlated with MD one (r=0.581, P<0.01) and four weeks (r= 0.703, P<0.01) after stroke, and the ADC correlated with MD twenty-four hours after stroke (r=0.519, P<0.05). The FA of one (r=0.525, P< 0.05) and four weeks (r=0.762, P<0.01) after stroke correlated with MD six months after stroke. Conclusion DTI can be used to evaluate the injury of optic radiation after ischemic stroke.

Key words: ischemic stroke, optic radiation, diffusion tensor imaging, visual field defects, fractional anisotropy, apparent diffusion coefficient