A factor VII concentrate for therapeutic use

The rare coagulation disorders - review with guidelines for management from the United Kingdom Haemophilia Centre Doctors' Organisation

The rare coagulation disorders are heritable abnormalities of haemostasis that may present significant difficulties in diagnosis and management. This review summarizes the current literature for disorders of fibrinogen, and deficiencies of prothrombin, factor V, FV + VIII, FVII, FX, the combined vitamin K-dependent factors, FXI and FXIII. Based on both collective clinical experience and the literature, guidelines for management of bleeding complications are suggested with specific advice for surgery, spontaneous bleeding, management of pregnancy and the neonate. We have chosen to include a section on Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome because haematologists may be consulted about bleeding manifestations in such patients.

Factor VII deficiency

As yet, there have been neither systematic reviews nor reports of randomized, controlled trials involving factor VII (FVII) deficiency. Hence, a picture of this disorder can only be drawn by reviewing and summarizing the data that is available. This article provides an overview of the understanding of this rare, inherited disorder of coagulation. In particular, the status of current knowledge of the disorder's prevalence, clinical presentation, diagnostic characteristics and molecular genetics is reviewed, followed by a summary of currently available options for its treatment and management.

[Practical approaches for surgical procedures in congenital factor VII deficiency]

A 33 year old female with a congenital deficit in factor VII underwent four operations, all without any haemorrhage. One of then was carried out using substitutive therapy. She had a non-A non-B hepatitis one month after this treatment. Substitutive therapy depends on the assessment of the risk of haemorrhage, which can be estimated by the concentration of factor VII, the severity of spontaneous haemorrhage, the surgical history, and the planned operation. Since the risk of transmitting viruses with freeze-dried blood products would appear to be virtually nil, since 1985, fresh frozen plasma should be avoided for this type of indication. The doses of concentrated factor VII to be used lie between 20 IU.kg-1 every 4 h and 40 IU.kg-1 every 8 h. Such a dose should be administered in either one or several injections, according to whether the risk of haemorrhage is important or not. Substitutive therapy should be continued as long as the risk persists. Using a test dose of factor VII and, afterwards, measuring its biological activity can help to determine the best time for starting the treatment in order to obtain a level of factor VII greater than the minimum required for surgical haemostasis (10%).