Scientists from Kumamoto University in Japan have created a new blood test that can catch the earliest signs of blood clotting.
This is a big step forward for treating heart disease and other conditions where blood clots can be dangerous. The new test can help doctors better understand how a person’s blood clots and make sure medications are working the way they should.
Blood clotting is the body’s natural way of stopping bleeding after an injury. It usually happens quickly and is very controlled. But if blood clots form too easily or not enough, it can lead to serious problems. Too much clotting can cause heart attacks, strokes, or blood clots in the lungs. Too little clotting can cause dangerous bleeding.
One of the earliest and most important signals in this process is a substance called thrombin. It helps kick off the clotting process. But until now, doctors haven’t had a good way to measure the very first small amounts of thrombin that appear.
The research team solved this problem by developing a new type of test called SMAT, short for a high-sensitivity coagulation assay. They used this test on 771 patients who had heart or blood vessel problems.
SMAT was able to detect small amounts of thrombin and how it formed through two different clotting pathways: one triggered by something called tissue factor, and another that depends on clotting factors known as FVIIIa and FIXa.
What they found was very exciting. Patients who were taking blood-thinning drugs, called DOACs (direct oral anticoagulants), showed very low levels of thrombin generation.
This means the test could clearly tell who was taking blood thinners and how well the medication was working. This could be very helpful for doctors who want to know if their patient’s medicine is having the right effect.
The test also showed that people’s health conditions affected how their blood clotted in different ways. For example, people with kidney disease who were on dialysis had lower thrombin levels, even if they were not taking any blood thinners.
People with cancer or chronic kidney disease had low thrombin levels specifically through the tissue factor pathway. This shows that different diseases change the clotting system in different ways—something that standard blood tests often miss.
One of the scientists, Associate Professor Yuichiro Arima, said that this new test lets doctors see the “earliest spark” of clotting, not just the end result. This could help them better understand a patient’s risk of either forming clots or bleeding, especially when considering other health problems and medications.
This research could change how doctors treat and monitor blood clotting in people with heart disease and other serious illnesses.
In the future, this test might help doctors create more personalized treatment plans based on how each patient’s blood behaves. It could also help predict health problems before they happen by giving a clearer picture of what’s going on inside the blood.
In conclusion, the SMAT test is a major breakthrough in understanding and monitoring blood clotting. It offers a more detailed look at how blood starts to clot and how this process changes with medication or disease. By using this test, doctors may be able to protect patients more effectively from dangerous clots or bleeding.
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The study is published in Thrombosis and Haemostasis.
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