FVIIa-antithrombin levels in early and late preeclampsia

Abstract Background Preeclampsia (PE) is associated with a hypercoagulability state. According to the gestational age (GA) at the onset of the disease, PE has been classified as early (GA  Objective We evaluated the FVIIa-AT complex levels in pregnant women with early and late severe PE (sPE), in order to verify if this biomarker can be useful for discriminating the two forms of the disease. Methods We evaluated 26 pregnant with severe early PE and 19 pregnant with severe late PE. FVIIa-AT levels were measured by STACLOT® (Diagnostica Stago). Statistical analysis was done by Mann-Whitney test. Results Increased FVIIa-AT levels were found in early sPE [148.4 pM (137.1)] compared to late sPE [95.9 pM (66.5)] (P = 0.046), which suggests a higher pro-coagulant state when PE onset occurs before 34 weeks of gestation. Conclusion These pioneer data allow inferring the relevance of FVIIa-AT as a device for early sPE diagnosis. However, the clinical relevance of FVIIa-AT complex surely needs to be fully clarified.