Heparin: An Essential Part of Treatment for Acute Hemophilia and Hematologic Disorders

 

Heparin, also known as unfractionated heparin, is a chemical that is produced in the liver and is found in blood clots. When these blood clots build up in the veins, it can result in blockage of the arteries. Since the arteries become more narrowed, the risk of the blood clot becoming dislodged becomes higher. When the arteries become blocked, it travels to the liver where it attaches itself to the clotting factor, forming an anticoagulant, or a clot-releasing agent, that brings the blood back into the arteries, again allowing the blood flow to return to the area where it originally came from.

Heparin, especially unfractionated hematopoietic stem cell transplantation, is an essential part of the treatment for acute hemophilia and hematologic disorders. This form of treatment involves injecting this clotting factor directly into the veins of the blood, thus stimulating the body's ability to produce more of the clotting factor to bind the blood clots. Although some people are allergic to the clotting factor, others may not be allergic at all, which means that heparin injection is not a dangerous injection for most people. The amount of heparin injected determines whether or not the treatment is successful.

Heparin is used in the treatment of atrial fibrillation. According to Heart and Circulatory Disease Statistics 2019 Published by the British Heart Foundation (BHF) in collaboration with the Institute of Applied Health Research at the University of Birmingham, in April 2019, 185,423 men and 155,331 women were diagnosed with AF in England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and United Kingdom in 2017/18.

Major studies are focused on assessing the efficacy of heparin alternatives in the treatment of venous thromboembolism. In December 2019, the Bristol-Myers Squibb-Pfizer alliance announced that Eliquis use was associated with lower rates of major bleeding, clinically-relevant non-major bleeding and recurrent venous thromboembolism compared to low-molecular-weight heparin for the treatment of venous thromboembolism in patients with active cancer, at the American Society of Hematology Annual Meeting.