Effects of nifedipine on platelet function

Impact of calcium antagonists on bleeding time in patients with chronic renal failure

“…In addition to the impaired haemostatic mechanism underlying chronic renal failure, calcium antagonists are reported to impair platelet aggregation, 3,4 prevent platelet adhesion, 10 and prolong bleeding time. 3 In the present study, during the treatment with calcium antagonists, the correlation between bleeding time and BUN is preserved, but shifted to lower BUN levels (Figure 2). Since hypertension is one of the most common complications in chronic renal failure, and end-stage renal failure favours the use of calcium antagonists rather than other antihypertensive agents (eg, ACE inhibitors), it is extremely important to evaluate the clinical relevance of the calcium antagonist in advanced chronic renal failure.…”

“…Most of these patients however are on the antihypertensive therapy, of which calcium antagonists are the most widely prescribed in this circumstance. Despite several lines of studies reporting the inhibitory effect of calcium antagonists on platelet function, [3][4][5][6] no investigations have been conducted examining the …”

“…Thus, Takahara et al 3 reported that nifedipine inhibited platelet aggregation induced by ADP and collagen. Similarly, amlodipine prevented platelet adhesion.…”

“…Although the main action of calcium antagonists is to relax vascular smooth muscle, these agents exert additional action. Thus calcium antagonists are reported to inhibit platelet aggregation [3][4][5][6] and elicit prolongation of bleeding time. 6 These observations suggest that when used in chronic renal failure, calcium antagonists might inhibit haemostatic mechanisms.…”

Effect of lacidipine and nifedipine GITS on platelet function in patients with essential hypertension

“…Dihydropyridine derivatives have also been shown to have an effect on platelet aggregation, especially in in vitro tests, that is, when concentrations of the agent are added to the test tube before the inductors agent. Thus, nifedipine 23 and nitrendipine 24 reduce the platelet aggregation in vitro at higher concentrations than those used in antihypertensive treatment. Other dihydropyridine derivatives, such as amlodipine, reduce platelet aggregation during antihypertensive therapy, as reported by Hernandez-Hernandez et al 25 when in a group of 12 patients with essential hypertension a 20-45% reduction in platelet aggregation was obtained using the same inducers tested in the present study.…”