The changes of blood platelet activation in breast cancer patients before surgery, after surgery, and in various phases of the chemotherapy

Abstract

Blood platelets from patients with cancer (before or after the surgery) exhibit a variety of qualitative abnormalities. Different anti-cancer drugs may also induce the oxidative/nitrative stress in blood platelets and change their hemostatic properties. The aim of our study was to explain the effect of superoxide anion radicals () production on hemostatic properties of blood platelets (activated by a strong physiological agonist – thrombin) from breast cancer patients before the surgery, after the surgery, and after various phases (I–IV) of chemotherapy (doxorubicin and cyclophosphamide). Patients were hospitalized in the Department of Oncological Surgery and at the Department of Chemotherapy, Medical University of Lodz, Poland. We measured the platelet aggregation as the marker of hemostatic activity of blood platelets. We observed an increase of in thrombin-activated blood platelets from patients with breast cancer (before or after the surgery and after various phases of the chemotherapy) compared to the healthy group. Our other experiments demonstrated that aggregation (induced by thrombin) of blood platelets from patients with breast cancer before the surgery, after the surgery, and after various phases of the chemotherapy differs from aggregation of platelets obtained from healthy volunteers. Moreover, our results showed the correlation between the generation and changes of platelet aggregation in breast cancer patients before the surgery, after the surgery, and after the chemotherapy (I and IV phases). Considering the data presented in this study, we suggest that the production of in blood platelets (activated by thrombin) obtained from breast cancer patients may induce the changes of platelet aggregation, which may contribute in thrombosis in these patients.