Clinical Manifestations and Bleeding Episodes Among Heterozygote Individuals of Factor XIII Deficiency, a Short Term Prospective Study

Background

Factor XIII deficiency (FXIIID) is a rare bleeding disorder (RBD) with high bleeding tendency. A wide spectrum of bleeding episodes was reported in patients with severe FXIIID. These bleeding diathesis include delay wound bleeding, intracranial hemorrhage, epistaxis and gum bleeding. A plasma level 3% to 10% of factor XIII is sufficient to prevent occurrence of bleeding in these patients. Here we design a study with two groups including heterozygote of FXIIID and normal population as a control group to assessed present of bleeding episodes in heterozygote patients.

Method

This prospective study was carried out on 53 (50 females and 3 males) heterozygote patients of FXIIID as well as the same number of normal population in duration of 3 months. All heterozygote individuals were selected from homozygote patients’ family. Healthy individuals were selected randomly from different parts of provinces. Both groups were age and sex matched (p=0.3). All individuals were assessed for factor XIII deficiency by FXIII activity assay and molecular analysis for Trp187Arg; the only previously reported polymorphism of factor XIII-A subunit in southeast Iran. Initially the clinical manifestations of all cases were assessed retrospectively and recorded. Then we assessed and compared the bleeding tendency in both groups by using the adult bleeding questionnaire and in one-month intervals.

Results

The mean ages of study populations were 34.8±8.4 (Ranges from 20 to 48 years) and 33.9±9.1 (Ranges from 21 to 49.5 years) in case and control groups, respectively. FXIII activity of the patient group was between 50-70 % and molecular analysis revealed that all the patients were heterozygote for Trp187Arg mutation. By regards to ethnicity, most of individuals in case group were Baluch (Number: 50 (94.3%)) and remained minority was Zaboli (Number: 3 (5.7%)). Distribution of ethnicity among case group was completely matched with control group (p=0.3). None of study individuals had a history of liver or kidney diseases or other bleeding susceptibility disorders. Clinical investigations indicated that 3 patients had a history of umbilical cord bleeding and delayed separation of the umbilical cord which led to administration of FXIII concentrate. All the 3 patients later presented with delayed post-circumcision bleeding.

The mean age of menorrhagia in 50 females was 13.9±1.1 (Ranges from 12 to 16 years). Menstrual intervals range from 20 to 60 days with a mean of 29±5.2 days, but half of the patients had a normal interval of 30 days. Twenty three females had experienced menstruations with the need for a new pad every 2 hours. Among affected females 15 had an abnormal menstruation with duration of more than 7 days. Eight females were complicated by menorrhagia. This phenomenon observed in only one female of control group and therefore a significant difference was found between cases and controls (p<0.014). Sixteen patients had experienced at least one spontaneous miscarriage and the time of abortion in 10 females was in first trimester. One patient had a history of 3 spontaneous abortions. All abortions were followed by prolonged bleedings which led to administration of FXIII concentrate. The incidence of spontaneous abortions between cases and controls was statistically significant (p <0.001). All the observed clinical manifestations and the bleeding score in both groups are given in table1.

Conclusion:

Our findings indicated that heterozygote carriers of FXIIID may be complicated by substantial bleeding events which may threat the life and lead to the requirement of prophylaxis administration.

Key words: Factor XIII deficiency, Heterozygote, Clinical manifestation