Heparin assays and bleeding complications in treatment of deep venous thrombosis with particular reference to retroperitoneal bleeding.

Bleeding complications occurred in 30 (11%) out of 280 patients who received continuous heparin infusion for deep venous thrombosis (DVT). 22 (8%) had minor while 8 patients (3%) had major bleeding complications (1 intrathoracic [fatal], 2 gastrointestinal and 5 retroperitoneal). Heparin activity, in daily drawn blood samples, was determined by four assays (chromogenic substrate [CS] assay, activated partial thromboplastin time [APTT], thrombin time with citrated plasma [CiTT] and thrombin time with recalcified plasma [CaTT]). The differences in median heparin activity between patients with minor bleeding and patients with no bleeding did not reach significance for any of the tests. In patients with major bleeding, the differences were significant with the CS (p = .011) and the CaTT (p = .030) assays. Patients with retroperitoneal bleeding had significantly increased median activity judged by all four assays: CS (p = .002), CaTT (p = .003), APTT (p = .010), CiTT (p = .029). The difference was most pronounced after four days of heparin treatment, but there was a considerable overlap with patients without bleeding.