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CHICAGO—Doruk Erkan, MD, MPH, a rheumatologist at the Hospital for Special Surgery and Weill Cornell Medicine in New York City, described recent developments in the field of antiphospholipid syndrome (APS) to the rheumatologists gathered for the ACR’s State-of-the-Art Clinical Symposium in April.
He introduced APS as a “field with limited data and lots of controversies,” although, he added that recently a significant amount of collaborative effort has been made to advance the field. For example, he discussed an international multidisciplinary effort underway to develop new APS classification criteria. The new criteria are being created using methodology endorsed by the ACR and European League Against Rheumatism (EULAR). Dr. Erkan said he hopes the APS classification criteria will be updated in the next few years.
Thrombosis Risk in aPL-Positive Patients
In addition, experts are creating improved risk calculation/stratification protocols for patients who test positive for antiphospholipid antibodies (aPL). This is important because the clinical manifestations of aPL occur on a spectrum and not every positive aPL result is clinically significant. Likewise, thrombosis is multifactorial, and many factors in addition to aPL can influence the thrombosis risk in aPL-positive patients.
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Sue Christman says
August 11, 2018 at 4:44 pmI am trying to get someone in my area to help me get screened. My older brother jut died 7/6/18 if CAPS. My grandmother passed away several years ago of a blood disorder. But APS wasn’t even on the radar. How can I get someone to listen to me and give me a hand with screening??
Keri Losavio says
August 14, 2018 at 1:18 pmI suggest you try the Find a Rheumatologist link on the ACR’s website.