Editorial: Clotting problems in young adults.

Abstract

An earlier editorial inThe Journal(230:1018, 1974) told of a report by Pirkle and Carstens 1 about sudden death in six persons consequent to widespread plugging of small pulmonary arteries and arterioles by platelet aggregates. All six patients were young; their ages ranged from 17 to 40 years. The suddenness of their death had precluded studies of the clotting properties of their blood—notably platelet hyperaggregability. In the January issue of Archives of Neurology (32:13-20, 1975), Kalendovsky et al report the finding of repeated cerebrovascular occlusions in four young patients (ages, 20 to 38 years). Three were women, two of whom were receiving birth control pills at the time they were first seen. All four patients had evidence of plasma hypercoagulability. Many months later, while not taking oral contraceptive agents and while receiving warfarin sodium therapy, two of the women and the man developed new cerebrovascular symptoms. At this time,