Clinical Significance of the Serotonin Release Assay and Platelet Count Monitoring After Cardiac Surgery

Heparin-induced thrombocytopenia (HIT) is one of the serious complications in patients who undergo cardiac surgery. However, there remains a major problem in diagnosing HIT because the current immunological assays for detection of HIT antibody have limitations. Furthermore, the clinical course of thrombocytopenia in this surgery makes it increasingly difficult to diagnose HIT. We investigated the relationship between platelet count and HIT antibody in 59 patients who underwent cardiac surgery using cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB). The number of postoperative HIT antibody-positive patients evaluated using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay kit (polyanion IgG/IgA/IgM complex antibodies/antiplatelet factor 4 enhanced) was 37 (62.7%). In contrast, platelet activation by HIT antibody was evaluated using the serotonin release assay (SRA). More than 20% and 50% release of serotonin was obtained from 12 patients (20.3%) and 8 patients (13.6%), respectively. The levels of d-dimer were significantly different on postoperative day 14 between SRA-positive and SRA-negative groups; however, postoperative thrombus complication was not detected using sonography in the patients with positive serotonin release at all. After being decreased by the operation, their platelet count recovered within 2 weeks in both groups equally. In our study, although the patients were positive in the platelet activating HIT antibody assay, they remained free from thrombosis and their platelet count recovered after early postoperative platelet decrease. Therefore, in addition to the SRA, monitoring of platelet count might be still considered an indispensable factor to facilitate the prediction of HIT thrombosis prior to manifestation in the patients undergoing cardiac surgery using CPB.