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Background:  Heparin-induced thrombocytopenia (HIT) is a rare complication of heparin treatments, and only a few large patient cohorts have been reported. In this study, biological and clinical data from 144 French patients with HIT were analyzed in comparison with the literature., Methods:  The diagnosis of HIT was confirmed in all patients by an immunoassay combined with serotonin release assay. In the literature, only cohorts of at least 20 HIT patients published from 1992 were selected for a comparative analysis., Results:  Two-thirds of patients were hospitalized in surgery and most were treated with unfractionated heparin (83.2% vs. 16.8% with low molecular weight heparin only). Thrombotic events in 54 patients (39.7%) were mainly venous (41/54). However, arterial thrombosis was more frequent after cardiac surgery (13.2% vs. 2.4% in other surgeries, p  = 0.042) with a shorter recovery time (median = 3 vs. 5 days, p  < 0.001). The mortality rate was lower in our series than in the 22 selected published studies (median = 6.3% vs. 15.9%). Three genetic polymorphisms were also studied and homozygous subjects FcγRIIA RR were more frequent in patients with thrombosis (37.8 vs. 18.2% in those without thrombosis, p  = 0.03)., Conclusion:  This study shows that the mortality rate due to HIT has recently decreased in France, possibly due to earlier diagnosis and improved medical care. It also confirms the strong association between polymorphism FcγRIIA H131R and thrombosis in HIT., Competing Interests: Y.G.: Consulting and/or travel fees from Octapharma, Shire, CSL Behring, Novo Nordisk, Bayer, LFB, and Léo Pharma. J.R.: Travel fees from Octapharma, Shire, and CSL Behring. C.V.: Travel fees from Sobi, Roche, Shire, and CSL Behring. D.F.: Consulting and/or travel fees from Aspen, Boehringer, Werfen, Stago, and Léo Pharma. A.B.: Travel fees from Aspen, Boehringer, Werfen, Pfizer, and LFB. A.L.: Consulting and/or travel fees from Bayer, LFB, Pfizer, Sobi, and Octapharma. E.D.M.: Travel fees from Sobi, Bayer, Novo Nordisk, and Pfizer. B.T.P.: Consulting and/or travel fees from Sobi, Bayer, Shire, CSL Behring, and Pfizer. I.E.: Consulting and/or travel fees from BMS, Aspen, Léo Pharma, Daiichi Sankyo, Pfizer, Sanofi-Aventis, and Shire. C.L.B.: Travel fees from Sobi, Octapharma, CSL Berhing, and Novo Nordisk. C.M.: Consulting and/or travel fees from BMS, Aspen, Pfizer, and Bayer. C.B.: Consulting and/or travel fees from CSL, Sobi, Bayer, and Novo Nordisk. C.T.: Consulting and travel fees from Sobi, Roche, Octapharma. F.N.G.: Travel fees from Sobi, Bayer, BMS, and Boehringer. J.D.: Travel fees from CSL and Novo Nordisk. T.B.A.: Travel fees from Servier and MSD. E.D.R.: Consulting and/or travel fees from Shire, Alexion, Sobi, Bayer, and Novo Nordisk. I.G.T.: Consulting and/or travel fees from Bayer, MSD, Pfizer, Sanofi-Aventis, and BMS. L.R.: Consulting and/or travel fees from CSL, LFB, Novo Nordisk, Sobi, and Bayer. B.T.: Consulting and/or travel fees from Sobi, Bayer, Novo Nordisk Aspen, CSL Behring, and Pfizer. C.P.: Consulting and/or travel fees from Sobi, Roche, Novo Nordisk, and CSL Behring. P.W., M.A.G., S.V., V.G.G., J.P., and B.G. have no conflict to disclose. All the authors did not receive any personal honorarium or funds related to the study reported in this manuscript. Y.G. reports grants from Ministère de la Santé (Government), during the conduct of the study; personal fees and nonfinancial support from CSL Behring, personal fees and nonfinancial support from Octapharma, nonfinancial support from Shire, personal fees from Léo Pharma, personal fees and nonfinancial support from LFB, nonfinancial support from Bayer, nonfinancial support from Novo Nordisk, outside the submitted work., (Georg Thieme Verlag KG Stuttgart · New York.)

Introduction: Recently, rapid immunoassays have been developed to allow the detection of antibodies anti-PF4/heparin. In this prospective study, we evaluated the performances of a automatized immunoassay (HemosIL HIT-Ab) in comparison with an ELISA (Zymutest HIA IgG) used for the diagnosis of heparin-induced thrombocytopenia (HIT) in association with the 4T's score., Methods: According to the 4T's score, samples with score ≤3 had no further analysis. Two immunological assays Zymutest HIA IgG and HemosIL HIT-Ab were performed in samples with score ≥4. In patients with at least one positive immunological assay or two negative immunological assays but with high-pretest probability (4T's score ≥6), HIT was screened by one functional assay using washed platelets., Results: The sensitivities of both assays were excellent and comparable (100%). The specificity was 92.3% for ELISA and 91.2% for HemosIL HIT-Ab. The analysis of the operating characteristics showed that both assays have almost identical ROCs (AUROC, 0.9951 and 0.9853, respectively, for ELISA and HemosIL HIT-Ab) and the calculating of the κ coefficient revealed a good agreement (0.67)., Conclusion: Performance characteristics of the HemosIL HIT-Ab are comparable to the Zymutest HIA IgG. The HemosIL HIT-Ab can be used in association with the 4T's score to rule out HIT., (© 2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)

Heparin-induced thrombocytopenia (HIT) is a severe complication of heparin therapy caused by an antibody against heparin/Platelet Factor 4 (PF4) complex. It complicates the treatment with unfractionated heparin (UFH). The aim of the study was to assess the interest of using confirmatory test in ELISA with use of high concentration of heparin (100 UI/mL) in patients (n=15) with discordance between platelet activation test and ELISA test. We obtained a rate inhibition higher than 50% in 86% of patients was observed. We conclude that inclusion of the high heparin confirmatory procedure in ELISA demonstrate the dependent heparin character of the antibodies but does not improve diagnostic specificity. In addiction a 2-fold increase in final test cost is observed.

We report a patient with a previously known primary antiphospholipid syndrome who had life threatening multiple arterial thromboses. The patient experienced a myocardial infarction with intraventricular thrombi under bromocriptine therapy in the puerperium, despite prophylactic low molecular weight heparin therapy. In this patient, no microvascular involvement was identified, thus eliminating the diagnosis of catastrophic antiphospholipid syndrome. Arterial thromboses may be explained by peripheral emboli originating from the intraventricular thrombi. This case emphasizes the necessity of a careful evaluation of the risk – benefit balance of bromocriptine therapy in patients with arterial risk factors. It also emphasizes the need for a correct diagnosis of catastrophic antiphospholipid syndrome allowing to limit the prescription of aggressive therapies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]