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Blood group and thrombosis
Back to Feature Story
November 2000
The association between high levels of factor VIII and risk of venous
thrombosis, which the Leiden group first described in 1995, explains
observations from the 1960s of a relationship between certain blood
groups (A, B, or AB) and a higher risk of thrombosis, says LETS study
investigator and clinical epidemiology professor F.R. Rosendaal, MD,
PhD, of the Hemostasis and Thrombosis Research Center, Leiden University
Medical Center.
"The explanation," he told CAP TODAY, "is that blood group O is
associated with lower levels of von Willebrand factor and therefore
with lower levels of factor VIII-since von Willebrand factor is
the carrier protein of factor VIII, which is much more readily degraded
when not bound to vWF."
These two relations-blood group with vWF and vWF with factor VIII-were
known for many years prior to their study, he says. "In the 1995
paper, we showed that factor VIII really is the final effector of
the risk. Since blood group is genetic, the issue of adjustment
for other factors becomes less relevant-other factors cannot affect
blood group."
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