Thrombosis |
From the Department of Internal Medicine I, Division of Hematology and Hemostaseology (CL, HG, RS, KL, IP); Department of Clinical Biometrics (AK); Department of Clinical and Laboratory Medicine (PQ,CM), Medical University Vienna, Austria
Correspondence: Ingrid Pabinger, Department of Internal Medicine I, Division of Hematology and Hemostaseology, Medical University Vienna, Währinger Gürtel 18-20, 1090 Wien, Austria. E-mail: ingrid.pabinger{at}meduni-wien.ac.at
|
|
|---|
Design and Methods: Three-hundred and sixty-one women with a first objectively confirmed VTE under 45 years of age (median age 29.6 years, interquartile range 21.9–36.9) known to our out-patient department were included in this retrospective analysis. These women were re-examined with regard to recurrence of thrombosis and laboratory thrombosis risk factors.
Results: Within a median observation period of 11.3 years, recurrent VTE occurred in 141 patients (39.2%). The cumulative probability of recurrence was 10.9% after 2 years, 29% after 10 years and 56% after 20 years. There were no significant associations between recurrence of VTE and laboratory risk factors such as natural inhibitor deficiency, factor V Leiden, the G20210A prothrombin variation, elevated factor VIII or hyperhomocysteinemia. Even women with more than one risk factor were not found to have a higher risk of recurrent VTE. Among the clinical characteristics only an increased body mass index (p=0.03) was associated with a higher probability of recurrence.
Interpretation and Conclusions: The risk of recurrent VTE in young women is higher than previously expected and remains constant over at least 20 years. Neither clinical features nor laboratory parameters help predict this risk. Thus, also in young women VTE should be regarded as a chronic disease.
Key words: recurrent venous thromboembolism, thrombosis risk factors, venous thromboembolism, young women.
Venous thromboembolism (VTE) is a serious clinical condition manifesting as deep venous thrombosis (DVT) and/or pulmonary embolism (PE). Patients with symptomatic VTE have a considerable risk of recurrent VTE that persists for many years.1 The duration of anticoagulant treatment after a first episode of VTE essentially depends on the estimated risk of recurrence. Two-thirds of first-time episodes of DVT occur in connection with external factors such as surgery, immobilization or trauma.2 In women, pregnancy, puerperium and oral contraceptives represent further risk factors. In addition, there are known a demographic risk factors for first VTE as well as for recurrent events, such as advanced age,3,4 obesity,5 cancer and male sex.3 Other clinical factors are known to increase the risk of recurrence, e.g. first manifestation as PE.6
During the last decade testing for thrombosis risk factors has become common practice. Several abnormalities in the coagulation system have been shown to be associated with an increased risk of thrombosis. Their impact on the recurrence rate has been the focus of several clinical studies. The association of the commonest inherited risk factors for thrombosis, factor V Leiden and the prothrombin G20210A variation, with recurrent VTE is still under discussion.7–11 Among the deficiencies of natural inhibitors, antithrombin deficiency has been shown to increase the risk for recurrence, whereas the same effect could not be demonstrated for protein C or protein S deficiency.12 High factor VIII levels13 and hyperhomocysteinemia14 have been reported to be associated with an increased risk of recurrence.
A number of studies evaluating the gender-specific risk of recurrence have revealed that women are at lower risk of experiencing a recurrent event than are men.3,5,12 However, the long-term incidence of recurrence and the role of risk factors have never been evaluated in women who present with a first VTE at an age younger than 45 years. We feel that it is very important to look at young individuals, since the duration of treatment with oral anticoagulants has major implications for their future life. Treatment with vitamin K antagonists increases menstrual bleeding,15 may cause coumarin embryopathy and increases the rate of spontaneous abortion.
The aim of our study was to evaluate the long-term recurrence rate in women who suffered a first venous thromboembolic event at a young age, as well as the predictive value of risk factors of thrombosis in regard to their impact on recurrence.
|
|
|---|
Laboratory analysis
Plasma samples were obtained from the patients after overnight fasting and centrifuged at 2000g for 20 minutes. Coagulation tests (lupus anticoagulant, factor VIII) were performed within 3 hours of blood sampling. For determination of natural coagulation inhibitors plasma was frozen at –20° C until analysis. For determination of homocysteine the samples were immediately cooled at 4° C and centrifuged within 30 minutes of sampling, snap frozen and stored at – 70° C. The diagnosis of the lupus anticoagulant was made according to the criteria of the International Society of Thrombosis and Haemostasis16 using two different screening tests (activated partial thromboplastin time and diluted Russels viper venom time) and confirmatory tests as described elsewhere.17 Antithrombin- and protein C activities were determined on the STA analyzer. Free protein S antigen was determined by an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). Factor VIII clotting activity (95th percentile of 307 healthy individuals - 248% used as cut-off) was determined by a one step clotting assay on a KC 10 coagulometer (Amelung, Lieme, Germany). Total homocysteine concentration (normal range for women < 13.6 µmol/L) was determined using a high performance liquid chromatography kit from Immunodiagnostic, Bensheim, Germany as described previously.18 The factor V:R506Q and the prothrombin G20210GA genotypes were analyzed by multiplex polymerase chain reaction (PCR) following the general principle of mutagenically separated PCR.19 An individual heterozygous for both mutations was included as a positive control in each experiment.
Statistical methods
To evaluate the time span up to the first recurrent event, we started the observation period after cessation of the anticoagulant treatment following the first VTE and concluded it at the first recurrence. If no anticoagulant treatment had been administered or anticoagulation treatment had been given for a short period only, the observation period started 3 months after the first event. The observation period for patients who did not experience a recurrent VTE ended at the time of the last follow-up. Probabilities of recurrence-free times were estimated by the Kaplan-Meier method20 and differences were tested using the log-rank test. Univariate and multiple Cox regression models21 were used to describe the unadjusted and adjusted effects of potential prognostic factors on the length of time up to the first recurrent event. The following prognostic factors were considered in the multiple regression model: deficiency of a natural inhibitor (yes/no), presence of factor V Leiden (yes, including heterozygous and homozygous individuals/no), presence of the prothrombin G20210A variation (yes, including heterozygous and homozygous individuals/no), hyperhomocysteinemia (yes/no), and factor VIII levels (as a continuous variable). Due to sporadically missing laboratory values, data from 327 (not all 361) women were used for the multiple Cox regression model. The strength of the prognostic factors is described by the estimate of the relative risk (with 95% confidence interval). p-values smaller than 0.05 were considered statistically significant.
|
|
|---|
|
View this table: [in a new window] [Download PPT slide] |
Table 1. a. Descriptive and laboratory risk factors for recurrent VTE in 361 women. b. Descriptive and laboratory risk factors in women who were taking oral contraceptives when the had their first VTE.
|
|
View this table: [in a new window] [Download PPT slide] |
Table 2. Site of first VTE in all women (n=361) and triggering factors in women with provoked first VTE (n=182).
|
![]() View larger version (12K): [in a new window] [Download PPT slide] |
Figure 1. Cumulative probability of recurrence after cessation of anticoagulation.
|
|
View this table: [in a new window] [Download PPT slide] |
Table 3. Hazard ratios for the risk of recurrence according to laboratory risk factors and clinical characteristics.
|
|
View this table: [in a new window] [Download PPT slide] |
Table 4. Multivariate analysis of established laboratory risk factors in the whole group of women and in those with unprovoked VTE.
|
|
|
|---|
In general, only a limited number of studies on recurrent VTE have long observation periods. In Table 5 we have listed eight studies with a median observation period exceeding 2 years. None of these studies covered a period of more than 20 years, a time-span that is unique to our study. It has to be mentioned that the studies differ remarkably with regard to inclusion criteria. Whereas one study included only patients with spontaneous thrombosis,3 some also included patients with provoked events4,5,12,22,23 and even patients with malignancy.24,25 The mean age at onset of the thrombotic disease also varied significantly, ranging between 32 and 66 years. Recurrence rates varied remarkably. After 2 years recurrence rates ranged between 8 and 12% and after 10 years between 18 and 40%. The highest recurrence rate after 10 years of observation was found by Prandoni et al.,23 who recently reported on one of the largest cohort of patients ever prospectively observed, a group of 1626 individuals. In this study the cumulative risk of recurrence amounted to 40% after 10 years, thus being considerably higher than that in our cohort. It must to be mentioned that the patients in the Italian study had a relatively high median age of 66 years, which in part might explain the high recurrence rate that was found.
|
View this table: [in a new window] [Download PPT slide] |
Table 5. Recurrence rates in studies with a median observation period > 2 years.
|
There is one important aspect that is rather unique to our patient population, namely that the presence of a triggering event at onset was not predictive for recurrence. One explanation for this result might be that we included only young women with VTE. In the general population the overall risk of thrombosis at this age is very low,25 so it can be speculated that in young patients with VTE an underlying thrombophilia is much more likely than in older patients, which consequently leads to a higher basic risk of thrombosis in these young patients and also to a higher recurrence rate. Indeed, when the rate of patients with established thrombophilia was compared among the different studies, the number of patients with an established thrombosis risk factor was highest in our study (56%) and much lower in other studies, e.g. that of Prandoni (24%)23 or of Garcia-Fuster (36%).5 Furthermore, it can be hypothesized that in a considerable number of young patients with VTE a yet unrecognized risk factor for thrombosis is present. The low number of women free of recurrence after a long period of time is most probably due to the persisting risk for developing thrombosis, which does not decline after a certain time period, as previously suggested by other authors.4, 26 Recently described laboratory parameters, such as D-dimer testing27 or the endogenous thrombin potential28 might better reflect the basic risk of thrombosis of an individual than thrombophilia testing.
Our study has some limitations. First of all, the design was not prospective, which may have led to an inclusion bias regarding women who had already suffered a recurrent VTE and were more willing to participate in the study than those who had remained free of thrombosis. The confirmation of recurrent VTE could represent another limitation. We decided to accept all patients, including the small number with not-objectively confirmed events, in the analysis if their symptoms had led to therapeutic anticoagulation. Exclusion of these probable events would not have changed the results considerably, as in the majority of patients (88%) the recurrent events were documented by objective methods as described above. We cannot provide data on mortality in our study population. However, as has been shown previously the mortality from recurrent VTE is low.4,29 Since our patients were not formally included in a prospective study, their prophylactic anticoagulation in risk situations may well have differed from that of subjects participating in prospective studies with regular visits. The situation in our study might better reflect daily practice and shows the constant risk of recurrence.
In summary, VTE must be regarded as a chronic disease, as convincingly demonstrated in our study. The risk of recurrence remains constant over at least 20 years and is, therefore, never negligible. In this respect, the question of long-term, even life-long anticoagulation treatment arises. In our study of a population of young women neither clinical features nor common laboratory risk factors nor the presence of known risk factors enabled us to identify patients at higher risk of suffering a recurrent VTE. These parameters do not help decisions on the duration of oral anticoagulant treatment.
CL: analyzing and interpretation of the data, writing the first draft, HG: contribution to study design, management of patient recruitment, collection of the data; AK: statistical analysis, PQ: managment of thrombophilia screening; RS: analysis and interpretation of data; CM: management of genetic investigations; KL: contribution to conception of the study, interpretation of data; IP: principal investigator, conception of the study and interpretation of data.
The authors reported no potential conflicts of interest.
Received for publication October 25, 2006. Accepted for publication June 27, 2007.
|
|
|---|
This article has been cited by other articles:
![]() |
W. M. Lijfering, N. J. G. M. Veeger, S. Middeldorp, K. Hamulyak, M. H. Prins, H. R. Buller, and J. van der Meer A lower risk of recurrent venous thrombosis in women compared with men is explained by sex-specific risk factors at time of first venous thrombosis in thrombophilic families Blood, September 3, 2009; 114(10): 2031 - 2036. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF] |
||||
![]() |
T. Zhu, I. Martinez, and J. Emmerich Venous Thromboembolism: Risk Factors for Recurrence Arterioscler Thromb Vasc Biol, March 1, 2009; 29(3): 298 - 310. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF] |
||||
![]() |
S. Eichinger, G. Hron, C. Bialonczyk, M. Hirschl, E. Minar, O. Wagner, G. Heinze, and P. A. Kyrle Overweight, Obesity, and the Risk of Recurrent Venous Thromboembolism Arch Intern Med, August 11, 2008; 168(15): 1678 - 1683. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF] |
||||
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||