Interactions between standard heparin and the physiological anticoagulant plasma protein, activated protein C (APC) were studied. The ability of heparin to prolong the activated partial thromboplastin time and the factor Xa- one-stage clotting time of normal plasma was markedly enhanced by addition of purified APC to the assays. Experiments using purified clotting factors showed that heparin en...

Venous thromboembolism (VTE) is a major public health problem leading to high morbidity and mortality in the United States. Since more then 50% of patients with VTE may have asymptomatic disease, the start of appropriate therapy often is delayed. Traditionally, intravenous unfractionated heparin (UFH) has been used to manage the acute phase of VTE. Although an effective agent, numerous limitati...

Anticoagulation for the open heart surgery patient undergoing cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB) is achieved with the use of heparin. The industry standard of activated clotting time (ACT) was used to measure the effect of heparin. The commonly acceptable target time of anticoagulation adequacy is 480 seconds or greater. Some patients, however, exhibit resistance to standard dosing of heparin and do ...

Acute venous congestion leads to blood stasis in the tissue and impaired blood perfusion. Using medicinal leech is an old method for reducing tissue congestion. There are numerous factors in leech saliva and hirudin that have important roles in the leeching beneficial effect. In this study, an animal study was performed to compare leech therapy with heparin therapy in the treatment of acute ven...

www.aafp.org/afp AMERICAN FAMILY PHYSICIAN 1097 160 patients with angiographically documented PE were divided into two groups, each of which received standard heparin or urokinase. Lung scans, pulmonary angiograms and measurements of right heart pressures and blood flow dynamics performed at 24 hours showed significant improvement only in the urokinase group. However, lung scans performed seven...

Despite dramatic advances in percutaneous coronary intervention, including coronary stents and potent antiplatelet agents, unfractionated heparin remains the standard procedural anticoagulant. Tradition and habit may have considerable influence over dose selection. A review of the role and dosage of heparin during PCI appears to be overdue

UNLABELLED Heparin and enoxaparin possess anti-inflammatory properties. We compared the effects of these drugs on inflammatory biomarkers in patients with ST-segment Elevated Myocardial Infarction (STEMI). Thirty four patients with STEMI randomly separated in two groups and received standard doses of heparin and enoxaparin. The serum concentration of Serum Amyloid A (SAA), C-Reactive Protein (C...

The year 2007 was marked by widespread adverse clinical responses to heparin use, leading to a global recall of potentially affected heparin batches in 2008. Several analytical methods have since been developed to detect impurities in heparin preparations; however, many are costly and dependent on instrumentation with only limited accessibility. A method based on a simple UV-scanning assay, com...

We describe a fully automated assay for determining effective heparin activity in plasma, based on heparin-catalyzed inhibition of Factor Xa (EC 3.4.21.6) by antithrombin III (AT III). Residual Factor Xa is determined kinetically by the Du Pont aca discrete clinical analyzer with a chromogenic substrate and is inversely related to heparin activity. Because the test plasma is the sole source of ...