Diminished Global Fibrinolytic Capacity in Patients With Mitral Valve Prolapse Is Associated With Transient Ischemic Attacks

Summary: Although mitral valve prolapse (MVP) has shown to be associated with thromboembolic complications, the cause of throm-boembolic events in those patients is still unknown. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the fibrinolytic activity in MVP patients. The study included 35 consecutive patients (25 women, mean age 25 ±11 years) with echocardiografically documented MVP and 25 age- and sex-matched subjects as a control group. Four of MVP pa-tients have a history of transient ischemic attack (TIA). Global fibri-nolytic capacity (GFC), a new technique that examines the effective-ness of the entire fibrinolytic system, was measured. Global fibri-nolytic capacity was found to be nonsignificantly increased in MVP patients (3.14 ±1.42 /-g/mL) compared to those in control subjects Global fibrinolytic capacity was studied in 35 consecutive patients with echocardiographically documented mitral valve prolapse (MVP) and 25 healthy subjects as a control group. Four of MVP patients had a history of transient ishemic attack (TIA). We found that global fibrinolytic activity was similiar in MVP patients without a history of TIA and control subjects. However, MVP patients with a history of TIA had significantly decreased global fibrinolytic activity compared to controls as did MVP patients without a history of TIA. Mitral valve prolapse (MVP) is a common dis-order, with prevalence estimates generally rang-ing from 2.4 % to 15 % in the general population The financial support of this study was funded by Hacettep