In vivo platelet activation in ischemic stroke patients.

Abstract

To the Editor: Recently, Marquardt et al1 addressed the important issue of evaluating markers for monitoring patients after ischemic stroke. They evaluated the expression of the platelet activation markers CD62P and CD63 by flow cytometry for 90 days after ischemic stroke. They showed that although both markers are initially increased, the expression of CD62P decreases rapidly and by day 14 is no longer significantly increased, while that of CD63 remains elevated for the study period. The expression of both antigens was independent of the inflammation markers studied, indicating that expression of platelet neoantigens might be used as an additional marker for monitoring these patients. Expression was not influenced by the different medications for secondary stroke prevention, suggesting that they might reflect mechanisms that could predict future vascular events. These results are very interesting because definition of reliable laboratory markers for diagnosing ischemic stroke, monitoring treatment, and predicting recurrence is a very important issue, particularly in the view of new and effective treatments that, however, are associated with significant complications.2,3 We performed a study investigating the expression of CD62P and CD63 antigens on circulating platelets in patients with acute ischemic disease on admission and after initiation of …