BETA‐THROMBOGLOBULIN (β‐TG) AND PLATELET FACTOR 4 (PF₄) IN OBSTETRICAL CASES

Abstract

The plasma levels of beta-Thromboglobulin (beta-TG) and Platelet Factor 4 (PF4) were measured in patients during the normal obstetrical period and in pre-eclampsia. A significant increase was observed in the two proteins with respect to the non-pregnant control group but no difference was seen between pregnancy and puerperium in either the normal or pre-eclamptic cases. The one significant variation in the concentration of the two proteins was a sharp rise during parturition. There was no correlation between beta-TG, PF4 and either the platelet count or creatinine but urea and uric acid did show a slight correlation with the two platelet proteins.

Platelets in Normal and Hypertensive Pregnancy

“…[16][17][18][19] This supports the occurrence of platelet activation in vivo during the later stages of pregnancy. Interestingly, Douglas et al showed that the increased levels of beta-TG in pregnancy were not associated with an increase in fibrinopeptide A, a marker of thrombin generation.…”

Premature labor: a state of platelet activation?

“…Moreover, the inverse relationship between the mean platelet volume and the platelet count observed during normal pregnancy led to the proposal that pregnancy is a state of compensated thrombocytolysis [129]. There are inconsistent reports concerning the degree of platelet activation and the release of vasoactive products during normal pregnancy [8,51,60,113,114]. Women who develop obstetric complications, such as preeclampsia and fetal growth restriction, have a higher degree of platelet activation than both normal pregnant and non-pregnant women [1,9,11,13,38,48,50,59,62,64,65,74,75,82,86,88,96,99,102,108,116,128,137]; however, little information is available regarding the association between maternal platelet activation and preterm labor (PTL) [117].…”