APLN and stroke disorder: Serum apelin-13 may be a potential prognostic biomarker for AIS. Serum apelin-13 levels is lower in the patients than healthy controls, patients with a NIHSS score ≤3 had higher apelin-13 levels. There is an association between apelin-13 and death or major disability at the 3-months follow-up, the patients with high apelin-13 levels show a lower incidence of stroke and combined events at the 1-year follow-up