Abstract
Level of Fibrinopeptide A (FPA) in plasma is considered to be the most sensitive indicator of thrombin activity.
Since Nossel and his colleagues described a radioimmunoassay (RIA) for FPA, several attempts have been made by other workers to overcome the problems relating to the original alcohol/dialysis method. Recently, Woodhams et al. devised a rapid RIA for FPA using Bentonite as an adsorbant of fibrinogen. We applied this method to FPA measurement and compared with Nossel's original method. A clinical assessment was made of FPA in various thrombotic disorders. The results were obtained as follows:
1) The RIA using Bentonite was simple and sensitive. Good reproducible results and higher recoveries were obtained in this method. The normal range for plasma FPA (0.1-2.6ng/ml) is similar to that reported using the original method. There was a good correlation between results obtained by the Bentonite and original method on same samples from patients, although the Bentonite method tended to give slightly lower values.
2) Among various thrombotic disorders, acute venous thrombosis tended to show higher FPA values compared with acute arterial occlusion. Risk factors of postoperative deep vein thrombosis (DVT) were investigated on 10 patients undergoing hip surgery. DVT was assessed by using mesurement of β-Thromboglobulin, FPA, and 125I-fibrinogen uptake test etc. DVT was found postoperatively in 6 of 10 cases. Measurement of FPA was the most reliable test for screening of DVT.
