Laboratory Guide to Disordered Haemostasis [antikvár]

Preface The role of a hospital blood coagulation laboratory is no longer limited to monitoring anticoagulant therapy and to superficial screening of a patient with a 'bleeding' tendency. An extensive range of tests of the haemostatic mechanism can now be provided as a routine service to patients and the onus of selecting appropriate tests and of interpreting the results usually falls on the laboratory haematologist or pathologist. Disordered haemostasis may result in haemorrhage or thrombosis or both. Thrombosis is much commoner but has hitherto proved more difficult to investigate and its mechanism harder to elucidate. Haemorrhage due to a defect in the haemostatic mechanism is rarer but is often acute, demanding urgent, if not immediate investigation; consequently the laboratory tests are more readily applied to identifying the cause of a haemorrhagic diathesis or haemostatic failure. The purpose of this book is to present, in a systematic manner, laboratory methods available for the investigation of haemostatic disorders. Some of these methods have their application in the rapid diagnosis and management of acute haemostatic failure, and others as elective procedures in the diagnosis of patients with a 'bleeding' tendency and in the treatment of patients with identifiable haemostatic disorders. Methods are described for the control of anticoagulant and fibrinolytic therapy. The early chapters summarize the current concepts of haemostasis and the characteristics of the constituents of the haemostatic mcchanism, as this knowledge is essential to an understanding of the principles of the tests and their interpretation. Although some classic and research methods have been omitted, the book is intended to be of use to technologists and trainee haematologists or pathologists. The author is particularly grateful to Dr. P. H. Pinkcrton, Director of the Department of Laboratory Haematology, for his critical advice and many suggestions for improvement of the text and content of the book during its preparation; to Dr. J. Blakely of the Clinical Haematology Division of the Department of Medicinc, vii