Effect of intravenous gammaglobulin on circulating and platelet-bound
antibody in immune thrombocytopenia
G Barbano, MN Saleh, PG Mori, AF LoBuglio and DR Shaw
Department of Medicine, University of Alabama, Birmingham 35294.
Ten patients with idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP) were studied
before and following a rise in circulating platelets subsequent to
infusions of intravenous gammaglobulin (400 mg/kg/day x 5 days). We
quantitated the amount of circulating IgG capable of binding to normal
donor platelets in vitro using an 125I-monoclonal anti-human IgG assay, as
well as the amount of IgG associated with the patients' platelets before
and following therapy. We found no evidence for a decrease in
platelet-specific IgG antibodies in these patients undergoing an acute
response to therapy. These data suggest that the short-term efficacy of
intravenous gammaglobulin is due to effects other than a substantive
reduction in platelet reactive antibodies, such as the alteration of
IgG-coated platelet destruction.
Volume 73,
Issue 3,
pp. 662-665,
02/15/1989
Copyright © 1989 by The American Society of Hematology
