Bleeding Disorders

VWD Diagnosis and Management Survey

Thanks to Elaine Benoit, Precision BioLogic, for referring the following survey, also found on LinkedIn. As recently announced, the ISTH is collaborating with ASH, NHF and WFH to create clinical practice guidelines for the diagnosis and management of von Willebrand Disease (VWD). In the initial phase of development, a stakeholder survey has been created to […]

Bleeding Disorders

July Quick Question: Factor IX Assay

Please refer to our July, 2018 Quick Question, which looks a lot like our June question about factor VIII assays. The new question asks about your approach to factor IX assays, and relates to concerns for accuracy when measuring the extended half-life factor IX concentrates.

Bleeding Disorders

Quick Question: Factor VIII Assay

Here are the unsurprising resuts of our June, 2018 Quick Question, “How do you measure factor VIII therapy?” Clot-based factor assay: 82% (36) Immunoassay: 5% (2) Chromogenic substrate: 14% (6) Dave McGlasson suggested this question because our current clot-based methods are unreliable when assaying for synthetic B-domain deleted and extended half-life preparations, many of which […]

Bleeding Disorders

Factor IX Gene Transfer

At the World Federation of Hemophilia World Congress, Spark Therapeutics and Pfizer Diagnostics announced factor IX gene transfer vector SPK-9001 success rates in 15 hemophilia B participants. Click or tap here for their press release.

Bleeding Disorders

Modified Nijmegen-Bethesda Assay

Precision BioLogic Inc. presented MNBA data at the World Federation of Hemophilia (WFH) 2018 World Congress in Glasgow, Scotland, May 20–24. Recognizing the need to improve factor VIII (FVIII) inhibitor testing for people with hemophilia A, the company studied the agreement between a chromogenic modified Nijmegen-Bethesda assay (MNBA) and a qualitative ELISA test in the […]

Bleeding Disorders

Critical Fibrinogen Levels

From Heather DeVries, Indiana University Health: Greetings George! One of the facilities in our system is questioning our critical fibrinogen level. Anything <70 mg/dL is considered critical, and they would like to know why we don’t use a cutoff of 100 mg/dL. Our current level was established before I came to IU Health, and our […]

Bleeding Disorders

Pseudothrombocytopenia

From Dr. Bruce King: I had a question about options for analyzing a patient sample that the platelets clump in all anticoagulants tested. We have a 61 y.o. female who was hospitalized for hypertensive issues and noticed some bruising (abdomen) which the patient said had increased over the last several weeks. During the hospitalization it […]

Bleeding Disorders

VWD Testing

Tiffany Jones at Orlando Health writes: “Hi, George! We are trying to update our VWF disease panel and we use the VWF:RCo plasma testing on our Stagos using Siemens reagent. When researching other algorithms I noticed there was VWF:Ac as well. Can you help clarify to me if both these tests are VWF activity assays? […]

Bleeding Disorders

Hemophilia: Gene Therapy

The February issue of CAP Today published an abstract describing some initial vector-mediated gene transfer therapy success using the vector AAV5-hFVIII-SQ. The work is published in Rangarajan S, Walsh L, Lester W, et al. AAV5–factor VIII gene transfer in severe hemophilia A [published online ahead of print December 9, 2017]. N Engl J Med. doi:10.1056/NEJMoa1708483. […]

Bleeding Disorders

Modified Nijmegen Bethesda Assay

On March 13, 2018. Precision BioLogic Inc., Dartmouth, NS, announced their development of a new approach to standardize and improve factor VIII inhibitor testing. Their press release (tap or click) referenced new data presented in a poster at the Thrombosis and Hemostasis Societies of North America, March 8–10, 2018 meeting, in San Diego, CA, USA. […]

Bleeding Disorders

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George Fritsma is a medical laboratory scientist, educator, and author. George holds faculty appointments with Rutgers University and Michigan State University, and is a member of the International Society on Thrombosis and Hemostasis, American Association of Clinical Chemists, and American Society for Clinical Laboratory Science.

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