Pseudothrombocytopenia: A Rare Phenomenon

Abstract

Thrombocytopenia is a serious situation that causes anxiety in doctors and patients due to its relationship with serious hemorrhagic manifestations. Pseudothrombocytopenia, however, is a situation without clinical interest because it is an in vitro decrease in platelet count. Pseudothrombocytopenia is related to the ethylenediaminetetraacetate (EDTA)-dependent exposure of antigenic determinants of platelet membrane gly coproteins gpIIb-IIIa and the subsequent reaction of common antibodies with these receptors. To our knowledge, a similar situation in Greece has not been reported. The main character istic of pseudothrombocytopenia due to EDTA is that the fall in platelet count is time-dependent and it disappears after the use of anticoagulant other than EDTA (e.g., citrate sodium or hep arin). We present seven cases of pseudothrombocytopenia re vealed when we used automatic hematologic analyzers and EDTA as an anticoagulant. After the use of another anticoagu lant (e.g., citrate sodium) the platelet count in the same hema tologic analyzer was normal.

Keywords

Key Words: Pseudothrombocytopenia EDTA-AnticoaguIant.

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