NEW YORK: Patients who have a stroke are less likely to die within the next week if they are admitted to a hospital on a weekday rather than over the weekend, neurologists in Canada report.

Still, patients should remember: "Time is brain," lead investigator Gustavo Saposnik said, "so the sooner the patient seeks medical attention, the higher the chance of better outcome, no matter the day, time or living area."

The so-called "weekend effect" has been documented for other serious conditions, such as a blood clot in the lung or a dangerous expansion of the wall of the aorta, the largest artery in the body, Saposnik, from the University of Toronto, and his associates write.

However, whether the phenomenon applies to stroke patients has not been fully explored. Using the Canadian Institute for Health Information's national database, the investigators identified some 26,676 patients.

The fatality rate over the next 7 days was 7.4% among the 20,047 patients admitted on weekdays, and 8.5% for the 6,629 patients admitted on weekends. Men and women were equally represented, and the average patient age in both groups was about 75 years.

After taking into account the effects of age, gender, other illnesses and medical complications, patients admitted on weekends had a 17% increased risk of death.

The discrepancy was larger in rural hospitals than in urban hospitals, and when the responsible physician was a general practitioner rather than a specialist.