[Treatment of acute pulmonary embolism with urokinase compared with the combination plasminogen-urokinase. Apropos of 67 cases].

Sixty-seven patients with recent acute pulmonary embolism (within 5 days) and an angiographic deficit of over 30% were included in a randomised study designed to compare the efficacy of the associations of urokinase-heparin (Group I) and lysyl-plasminogen-urokinase-heparin (Group II). Plasminogen was administered as an intravenous bolus of 150 microkatal units at the beginning of the urokinase infusion, the dosage of which was set at 2 700 000 IU over 24 hours. Both groups received anticoagulant doses of heparin. The efficacy of treatment was judged by early revascularisation on pulmonary angiography performed during the 24 hours after the end of treatment and by changes in the parameters of fibrinolysis and its inhibitors. The clinical features of the two groups were comparable but the angiographic changes were more pronounced in Group I (deficit: 68.5 +/- 10.4% vs 62.3 +/- 10.9%, p less than 0.02). Treatment had to be stopped before the 24th hour in 4 cases (3 early deaths and 1 severe haemorrhage). The average revascularisation was 30.5 +/- 6.8% in Group I and 38.3 +/- 31.1% in Group II (NS). The alpha-2-antiplasmins were lower (NS) in Group II as were the fibrinogen levels (p less than 0.01 at the 12th and 24th hour) whilst the plasminogen levels and surface of fibrin plateaux were higher (p less than 0.01 at the 6th hour and p less than 0.05 at the 12th hour, respectively). These results show that moderate doses of urokinase associated with heparin are effective in the treatment of acute pulmonary embolism.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)